ABRAHAM   LINCOLN 


fff, 


ABRAHAM 
LINCOLN 

A   BIOGRAPHICAL   ESSAY     • 

BY  CARL  SCHURZ 

WITH  AN  ESSAY  ON 

THE  PORTRAITS  OF  LINCOLN 

BY  TRUMAN  H.  BARTLETT 

ILLUSTRATED 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 

MDCCCCVII 


COPYRIGHT   iSgi   BY  CARL  SCHURZ 
COPYRIGHT   1907  BY  HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 

ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED 


OF  THIS  EDITION   1 040  COPIES    WERE    PRINTED 
AT  THE  RIVERSIDE  PRESS  CAMBRIDGE  MDCCCCVII 


CONTENTS 

ON    THE    LIFE-MASK    OF    ABRAHAM 

LINCOLN  Page   i 

By  RICHARD  WATSON  GILDER 

THE  PORTRAITS  OF  LINCOLN  5 

By  TRUMAN  H.  BARTLETT 

THE  HAND  OF  LINCOLN  39 

By  EDMUND  CLARENCE  STEDMAN 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN:  A  BIOGRAPHICAL 

43 
By  CARL  SCHURZ 


NOTES   ON   THE   ILLUSTRATIONS 


NOTES  ON  THE  ILLUSTRATIONS 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  IN   1863  Frontispiece 

This  photograph  was  made  by  Brady  on  the  Sunday  before 
the  Gettysburg  speech,  delivered  November  19,  1863.  The 
following  account  of  the  circumstances  attending  it  is  taken 
from  an  article  by  Noah  Brooks  in  "Scribner's  Magazine"  for 
February,  1878:  — 

"One  Saturday  night,  the  President  asked  me  if  I  had  any 
objection  to  accompanying  him  to  a  photographer's  on  Sun 
day.  He  said  that  it  was  impossible  for  him  to  go  on  any  other 
day,  and  he  would  like  to  have  me  see  him  '  set.'  Next  day  we 
went  together,  and  as  he  was  leaving  the  house  he  stopped  and 
said, f  Hold  on,  I  have  forgotten  Everett!'  Stepping  hastily 
back,  he  brought  with  him  a  folded  paper,  which  he  explained 
was  a  printed  copy  of  the  oration  that  Mr.  Everett  was  to 
deliver,  in  a  few  days,  at  Gettysburg.  It  occupied  nearly  the 
whole  of  two  pages  of  the  '  Boston  Journal,'  and  looked  very 
formidable  indeed.  As  we  walked  away  from  the  house,  Lin 
coln  said,  '  It  was  very  kind  in  Mr.  Everett  to  send  me  this. 
I  suppose  he  was  afraid  I  should  say  something  that  he  wanted 
to  say.  He  need  n't  have  been  alarmed.  My  speech  is  n't 
long.'  *  So  it  is  written,  is  it,  then  ? '  I  asked.  '  Well,  no,'  was 
the  reply.  'It  is  not  exactly  written.  It  is  not  finished,  any 
way.  I  have  written  it  over,  two  or  three  times,  and  I  shall 
have  to  give  it  another  lick  before  I  am  satisfied.  But  it  is  short, 
short,  short.'  I  found,  afterward,  that  the  Gettysburg  speech 
was  actually  written,  and  rewritten  a  great  many  times.  The 
several  draughts  and  interlineations  of  that  famous  address, 
if  in  existence,  would  be  an  invaluable  memento  of  its  great 
author.  Lincoln  took  the  copy  of  Everett's  oration  with  him 
to  the  photographer's,  thinking  that  he  might  have  time  to 
look  it  over  while  waiting  for  the  operator.  But  he  chatted 
so  constantly,  and  asked  so  many  questions  about  the  art  of 


x  NOTES  ON 

photography,  that  he  scarcely  opened  it.  The  folded  paper  is 
seen  lying  on  the  table,  near  the  President,  in  the  picture  which 
was  made  that  day." 

THE  LIFE-MASK  OF  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN, 
FULL-FACE  VIEW  FROM  THE  PLASTER  Page  3 

This  life-mask  of  Lincoln  was  made  by  Leonard  W.  Volk  in 
April,  1860,  just  before  Lincoln's  nomination  for  the  presi 
dency.  A  few  replicas  of  the  mask  in  plaster  were  early  made, 
and  it  has  also  been  cast  in  bronze,  —  in  Paris,  in  1877,  under 
the  direction  of  Mr.  Truman  H.  Bartlett,  and  in  New  York, 
a  few  years  later,  as  the  result  of  a  subscription  taken  for  this 
purpose.  An  important  account  of  the  making  of  the  mask, 
written  by  the  sculptor  himself,  will  be  found  in  the  "  Cen 
tury  Magazine"  for  December,  1881^ 

• 

THE  LIFE-MASK  OF  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN, 
THREE-QUARTERS  VIEW  FROM  THE  PLAS 
TER  Page  12 

RIGHT  PROFILE  OF  THE  MASK  IN  BRONZE 

Page  1 8 

LEFT  PROFILE  OF  THE  MASK  IN  BRONZE    Page  22 

PROFILES  OF  LINCOLN  AND  WASHINGTON  Page  26 

The  life-mask  of  Lincoln  by  Leonard  W.  Volk  and  that  of 
Washington  by  the  French  sculptor  Houdon  are  considered 
the  two  most  important  contributions  yet  made  to  American 
plastic  portraiture.  The  profile  of  Washington  is  taken  from 
Houdon's  bust,  the  face  of  which  was  practically  a  replica  of 
the  life-mask. 


THE   ILLUSTRATIONS  xi 

THE  HANDS  OF  LINCOLN  Page  30 

The  casts  of  the  hands  of  Lincoln  were  made  by  Leonard 
W.  Volk  in  June,  1860,  just  after  Lincoln's  nomination 
for  the  Presidency.  Replicas  in  plaster  and  bronze  are  not 
uncommon. 

THE  HAND  OF  LINCOLN  Page  41 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  IN  1859  Page  so 

From  an  original  photograph  owned  by  William  Lloyd  Gar 
rison  of  Lexington,  Mass.  This  photograph  was  made  by 
A.  W.  Fassett  of  Chicago  in  October,  1859,  and  the  nega 
tive  was  lost  in  the  great  Chicago  fire  in  1871. 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  IN  1861  Page  64 

From  a  rare  photograph  by  an  unknown  photographer,  copy 
righted  in  1 86 1  by  D.  Appleton  &  Company.  From  a  copy 
in  the  possession  of  Francis  J.  Garrison  of  Lexington,  Mass. 

LINCOLN  WITH  HIS  GENERALS  AT  ANTIETAM 

Page  jo 

From  a  photograph  taken  by  Alexander  Gardner  for  Brady 
just  after  the  battle  of  Antietam  on  thejd  of  October,  1862. 
The  original  negative  is  now  in  the  possession  of  the  War 
Department  at  Washington. 

LINCOLN  AND  GENERAL  McCLELLAN  Page  82 

From  a  photograph  by  Gardner  taken  at  the  same  time  as  the 
foregoing.  The  original  negative  is  in  the  possession  of  the 
War  Department  at  Washington. 


xii  NOTES  ON 

LINCOLN  STANDING  ALONE  Page  88 

This  is  an  enlargement  of  Lincoln's  figure  in  a  photograph  by 
Brady  of  a  group  composed  of  Lincoln,  Gen.  J.  A.  McCler- 
nand,  and  Pinkerton  the  army  detective. 

RIGHT   AND    LEFT    PROFILES    OF    ABRAHAM 
LINCOLN  Page  94 

The  profile  of  the  right  side  of  Lincoln's  face  is  from  a  pho 
tograph  made  by  Brady  in  1864.  That  of  the  left  side  was 
made  by  Brady  on  November  8,  1863. 

LINCOLN  AND   HIS  SECRETARIES,  JOHN  HAY 
AND  JOHN  G.  NICOLAY  Page  102 

From  a  photograph  by  Brady  taken  at  the  same  time  as  the 
left  profile,  November  8,  1863. 

ABRAHAM   LINCOLN  IN  1864  Page  no 

From  an  un-retouched  negative  made  March  9,  1864,  by 
Rice.  This  negative,  with  one  of  General  Grant,  was  made  in 
commemoration  of  the  appointment  of  Grant  as  Lieutenant- 
General  and  Commander  of  all  the  armies  of  the  Republic. 

LINCOLN  AND  HIS  SON  "TAD"  Page  122 

From  a  photograph  of  uncertain  date,  by  Brady. 

LINCOLN  IN  1865  Page  128 

From  the  photograph  by  H.  F.  Warren  of  Waltham,  Mass., 
taken  March  6,  1865.  The  following  interesting  account  of 


THE   ILLUSTRATIONS  xiii 

this  late  and  important  picture  of  Lincoln  was  communicated 
to  the  "  Century  Magazine"  for  October,  1882,  by  Mr.  Alex 
ander  Starbuck  of  Waltham,  Mass. :  — 
"About  the  last  of  February,  1865,  Mr.  H.  F.  Warren,  a 
photographer  of  Waltham,  Mass.,  left  home,  intending,  if 
practicable,  to  visit  the  army  in  front  of  Richmond  and  Pe 
tersburg.  Arriving  in  Washington  on  the  morning  of  the  4th 
of  March,  and  finding  it  necessary  to  procure  passes  to  carry 
out  the  end  he  had  in  view,  he  concluded  to  remain  there 
until  the  inauguration  ceremonies  were  over,  and,  having  car 
ried  with  him  all  the  apparatus  necessary  for  taking  nega 
tives,  he  decided  to  try  to  secure  a  sitting  from  the  President. 
At  that  time  rumors  of  plots  and  dangers  had  caused  the  friends 
of  President  Lincoln  to  urge  upon  him  the  necessity  of  a  guard, 
and,  as  he  had  finally  permitted  the  presence  of  such  a  body, 
an  audience  with  him  was  somewhat  difficult.  On  the  afternoon 
of  the  6th  of  March,  Mr.  Warren  sought  a  presentation  to  Mr. 
Lincoln,  but  found,  after  consulting  with  the  guard,  that  an  in 
terview  could  be  had  on  that  day  in  only  a  somewhat  irregular 
manner.  After  some  conversation  with  the  officer  in  charge, 
who  became  convinced  of  his  loyalty,  Mr.  Warren  was  admitted 
within  the  lines,  and,  at  the  same  time,  was  given  to  understand 
that  the  surest  way  to  obtain  an  audience  with  the  President 
was  through  the  intercession  of  his  little  son  *  Tad.'  The  lat 
ter  was  a  great  pet  with  the  soldiers,  and  was  constantly  at 
their  barracks,  and  soon  made  his  appearance,  mounted  upon 
his  pony.  He  and  the  pony  were  soon  placed  in  position  and 
photographed,  after  which  Mr.  Warren  asked '  Tad '  to  tell  his 
father  that  a  man  had  come  all  the  way  from  Boston,  and  was 
particularly  anxious  to  see  him  and  obtain  a  sitting  from  him. 
*  Tad  '  went  to  see  his  father,  and  word  was  soon  returned  that 
Mr.  Lincoln  would  comply.  In  the  mean  ti-me  Mr.  Warren  had 
improvised  a  kind  of  studio  upon  the  south  balcony  of  the 
White  House.  Mr.  Lincoln  soon  came  out,  and,  saying  but 
a  very  few  words,  took  his  seat  as  indicated.  After  a  single 
negative  was  taken,  he  inquired, c  Is  that  all,  sir  ? '  Unwilling  to 
detain  him  longer  than  was  absolutely  necessary,  Mr.  Warren 


xiv     NOTES  ON  THE  ILLUSTRATIONS 

replied,  c  Yes,  sir,'  and  the  President  immediately  withdrew. 
At  the  time  he  appeared  upon  the  balcony  the  wind  was  blow 
ing  freshly,  as  his  disarranged  hair  indicates,  and,  as  sunset  was 
rapidly  approaching,  it  was  difficult  to  obtain  a  sharp  picture. 
Six  weeks  later  President  Lincoln  was  dead,  and  it  is  doubtless 
true  that  this  is  the  last  photograph  ever  made  of  him." 
There  is  a  good  deal  of  evidence  to  point  to  the  belief  that 
the  so-called  "last"  photograph  of  Lincoln  by  Gardner,  for 
which  the  date  of  April  9,  1865,  is  given,  was  actually  taken 
somewhat  earlier  than  this  by  Warren. 


ON   THE   LIFE-MASK  OF 
ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 


ON  THE  LIFE-MASK  OF 
ABRAHAM  LINCOLN 

THIS  bronze  doth  keep  the  very  form  and  mould 

Of  our  great  martyr's  face.   Yes,  this  is  he: 

That  brow  all  wisdom,  all  benignity ; 

That  human,  humorous  mouth;   those  cheeks  that  hold 
Like  some  harsh  landscape  all  the  summer's  gold; 

That  spirit  fit  for  sorrow,  as  the  sea 

For  storms  to  beat  on ;  the  lone  agony 

Those  silent,  patient  lips  too  well  foretold. 
Yes,  this  is  he  who  ruled  a  world  of  men 

As  might  some  prophet  of  the  elder  day  — 

Brooding  above  the  tempest  and  the  fray 
With  deep-eyed  thought  and  more  than  mortal  ken. 

A  power  was  his  beyond  the  touch  of  art 

Or  armed  strength  —  his  pure  and  mighty  heart. 

RICHARD  WATSON  GILDER. 


THE  PORTRAITS  OF  LINCOLN 


THE  PORTRAITS  OF 
LINCOLN 


T  is  the  popular  belief,  the  world 
over,  that  Abraham  Lincoln  was 
in  face  and  figure,  in  action  or 
repose,  an  ugly  man.  It  is  doubt 
ful  if  any  human  being  known  to 
history  has  been  the  subject  of 
such  complete  and  reiterated  description,  by  high 
and  low,  friend  and  enemy;  and  the  vocabulary 
employed  to  describe  him  includes  about  every 
word  in  common  use  in  the  English  language,  the 
meaning  of  which  is  opposed  to  anything  admir 
able,  elegant,  beautiful,  or  refined.  The  words  used 
to  set  forth  the  physical  appearance  of  this  per 
sonage,  now  rated  by  imposing  fame  as  one  of  the 
Great  of  the  Earth,  gather  when  assembled  a  new 
and  affecting  interest. 

From  the  time  Abraham  Lincoln  was  fourteen 
years  of  age,  then  more  than  six  feet  high  and 
weighing  about  one  hundred  and  sixty  pounds, 
until  he  was  nominated  for  the  Presidency,  he 
was  locally  known  by  the  following  pleasing  char- 


8  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

acterizations :  "angular,"  "ungainly,"  "clumsy," 
"gaunt;"  "awkward,"  "thin,"  "leggy,"  "gawky  ;" 
"gigantic,"  "solemn  visaged,"  "beardless  clodhop 
per;"  "uncouth,"  "half-clad  boor,  whose  heavy 
features  were  flabby,  lifeless,  and  deeply  furrowed ; " 
"a  homely,  lank,  long,  dried-up,  bony-armed  man, 
with  leathery  face,  shrivelled  and  yellow;  "  "long- 
limbed,  brawny-handed,  queer-looking  old  fellow, 
with  prominent  features,  dull  and  expressionless; " 
"rough-looking  backwoodsman  with  a  wiry,  raw- 
boned,  tall  frame  and  ganglion  legs."  His  clothes 
and  his  unconventional  movements  and  manners 
have  received  a  similar  unflattering  description. 

During  Lincoln's  stumping  tours  near  home  or 
in  the  neighboring  states,  his  personal  appearance 
received  its  accustomed  attention.  In  Michigan, 
in  1856,  talking  for  Fremont,  he  was  known  as  the 
"  Long  Sucker  of  Illinois;  "  in  Ohio,  the  "  Giant 
of  the  Sangamon  Bottoms;"  and  farther  west,  the 
"Illinois  Rail  Splitter,"  and  other  suggestive  names. 
Lincoln  himself  was  not  impressed  with  his  own 
beauty,  and  often  referred,  throughout  his  life,  to 
his  physical  plainness,  though  claiming  that  inside 
he  was  as  much  of  a  gentleman  as  any  one ;  and  even 
Mrs.  Lincoln  called  him  an  "ungainly"  husband. 

Joseph  Medill,  editor  of  the  Chicago  "  Tribune," 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  9 

who  was  with  Lincoln  occasionally  during  the 
Douglas  debates,  says  that  it  was  a  standing  joke 
of  his  that  there  was  one  "  homelier"  man  in  Illi 
nois  than  himself,  and  that  was  his  friend  Archie 
Williams  of  Quincy,  who,  he  said,  had  carried  the 
ugly  man's  jack-knife  for  twenty  years  without 
meeting  a  successful  competitor  for  it,  and  he  reck 
oned  Archie  would  carry  it  as  long  as  he  lived, 
though  when  he  died  it  would  descend  to  himself. 
But  Lincoln  got  his  jack-knife  before  death  got 
Archie.  "I  was  accosted  on  the  cars,"  so  he  told 
the  story,  "by  a  stranger,  who  said,  < Excuse  me, 
sir,  I  have  an  article  in  my  possession  which  be 
longs  to  you.'  <How  is  that?'  I  asked,  consider 
ably  astonished.  The  stranger  took  a  jack-knife 
from  his  pocket.  <  This  knife,'  he  said,  <  was  placed 
in  my  hands  some  years  ago,  with  the  injunction 
that  I  was  to  keep  it  until  I  found  a  man  uglier 
than  myself.  I  have  to  say,  sir,  that  I  think  you 
are  fairly  entitled  to  the  property.' ' 

Only  once  in  his  life,  perhaps,  did  Lincoln  be 
come  painfully  conscious  of  the  miserable  appear 
ance  of  his  clothes,  and  that  was  when  he  came  to 
New  York  in  1860  to  make  his  Cooper  Institute 
speech.  He  brought  with  him  a  new  suit  of  black 
and  wore  it  when  he  was  waited  upon  by  the  re- 


I0  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

presentatives  of  the  Republican  Club.  He  noticed 
the  difference  between  their  well-cut,  smooth- 
fitting  garments  and  his  ill-fitting  and  badly- 
wrinkled  ones,  and  spoke  of  it  freely  to  them. 
On  his  return  to  Springfield  he  told  Herndon,his 
law  partner,  that  for  some  time  after  he  began  his 
speech,  and  until  he  became  warmed  up,  he  im 
agined  that  the  audience  were  noticing  the  con 
trast  between  his  rude  Western  clothes  and  the 
neat  and  well-made  suits  of  Mr.  Bryant  and  others 
who  sat  on  the  platform.  But  this  annoyance  was 
of  short  duration,  and  he  made  no  effort  while 
in  the  East  to  improve  his  appearance. 

As  a  Presidential  candidate  Lincoln  appeared 
to  the  country  an  untoward  being  in  face,  figure, 
and  movement.  The  recorded  observations  of 
the  President's  personal  appearance  from  the 
time  he  arrived  in  Washington  until  his  death, 
made  by  an  ever-increasing  number  and  almost 
indescribable  diversity  of  people,  corroborated 
Western  observation,  giving  no  indication  that 
the  older  East  saw  differently  from  the  younger 
West.  And  so,  in  consequence,  while  the  feeling 
of  Lincoln's  rare  and  superior  worth  as  a  man 
has  steadily  increased  since  his  death,  with  start 
ling  strides  and  unexpected  surprises,  his  personal 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  n 

appearance  as  it  was  first  described  has  gone  into 
unquestioned  history.  Biographers,  statesmen, 
scholars,  and  writers  have  echoed  ordinary  ob 
servers  with  such  persistence  that  it  would  seem 
that  they  took  delight  in  trying  to  heighten  the  in 
congruous  contrast  between  the  outward  and  the 
inward  man. 

Lowell,  in  the  "  North  American  Review  "  for 
January,  1 864,  apologized  for  Lincoln's  not  being 
handsome  or  elegant,  and  at  the  close  of  the 
article  called  him  homely  and  awkward.  In  his 
"Commemoration  Ode,"  while  fully  recognizing 
the  high  character  of  the  first  American,  he  says 
that  "  they  (the  people)  knew  that  outward  grace 
is  dust."  In  his  Birmingham  address  he  again  al 
ludes  to  this  contrast,  remarking:  "But  democra 
cies  have  likewise  their  finer  instincts.  I  have 
also  seen  the  wisest  statesman  and  most  pregnant 
speaker  of  our  generation,  a  man  of  humble  birth 
and  ungainly  manners,  of  little  culture  beyond 
what  his  own  genius  supplied,  become  more  ab 
solute  in  power  than  any  monarch  of  modern 
times,  through  the  reverence  of  his  countrymen 
for  his  honesty,  his  wisdom,  his  sincerity,  his  faith 
in  God  and  man,  and  the  nobly  humane  sim 
plicity  of  his  character." 


12  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

Almost  the  only  person  who  has  publicly  writ 
ten  against  the  popular  belief  concerning  Lin 
coln's  personal  appearance  is  Hon.  J.  G.  Nicolay, 
the  President's  private  secretary  and  subsequent 
co-biographer. 

He  says  that  to  him  "  there  was  neither  oddity, 
eccentricity,  awkwardness,  or  grotesqueness  in  his 
face,  figure,  or  movement ; ' '  that,  on  the  contrary, 
he  was  prepossessing  in  appearance  when  the  en 
tire  man  was  fairly  considered,  mentally  and  phy 
sically,  his  unusual  height  and  proportion,  and  the 
general  movement  of  body  and  mind. 

He  also  states  that  Lincoln's  "walk  was  vigor 
ous,  elastic,  easy,  rather  quick,  firm,  and  digni 
fied;  no  shuffling  or  hesitating;  he  had  a  large 
swing  in  his  movement;  and  when  enunciating 
a  great  thought  that  he  wished  to  impress  upon 
his  hearers  he  would  straighten  up  to  an  impres 
sive  height." 

Mr.  Nicolay  gives  this  as  his  impression  of  Lin 
coln's  appearance  without  seeking  to  corroborate 
it  by  any  fact  of  physical  construction.  If  the 
words  quoted  at  the  beginning  of  this  paper  were 
to  be  taken,  as  they  have  been  by  the  world,  as 
final  and  conclusive,  and  there  were  nothing  else 
than  the  uncorroborated  opinion  of  Mr.  Nicolay 


__///>••   //v/.>£-  <y  <   'T/'r 

&*4<*.rfet&'siH<e4<>  X/rv/*  //f  /t/tr. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  13 

to  assist  in  further  examination,  there  would  be 
no  way  out  of  the  belief  that  Lincoln  was  an 
"  awfully  homely  "  man,  —  a  human  frame  cruelly 
proportioned,  with  articulations  orderless,  aim 
less,  and  unpleasant,  housing  a  wonderful  heart 
and  mind.  But  the  truth  is  that  these  words  were, 
in  the  large  majority  of  cases,  only  parts  of  sen 
tences,  or  parts  of  a  thoughtless  general  summing 
up  of  the  personal  appearance  of  the  man,  while  the 
other  parts  included  words  indicative  of  beauti 
ful  physical  qualities,  or  statements  of  mental  and 
physical  relationships,  admirable,  significant,  and 
suggestive. 

Nor  are  these  desirable  qualities  and  relation 
ships  isolated  ones,  peculiar  to  or  only  affecting 
single  members  of  the  body;  they  are  intimately 
connected  with  the  whole  physical  structure,  and 
furnish  evidence  that  it  was  different  from  the 
physique  first  described.  The  excellences  of 
Lincoln's  appearance  may  be  classed  under  two 
heads, — facial  expression  and  general  movement 
of  the  body. 

The  following  descriptions  of  Lincoln's  eyes 
were  spoken  or  written  without  qualification,  and 
are  taken  from  a  large  number  of  sources,  many 
of  them  being  the  recollections  of  women:- 


i4  ABRAHAM   LINCOLN 

"Soft,  tender,  bluish  eyes;'  "two  bright, 
dreamy  eyes  that  seem  to  gaze  through  you  with 
out  looking  at  you  ;  "  «  patient,  loving  eyes ;  ' 
« the  kindest  eyes  ever  placed  in  mortal  head ;  ' 
«  His  eyes  had  an  expression  impossible  to  de 
scribe,  as  though  they  lay  in  deep  caverns,  ready 
to  spring  out  at  an  instant  call ; '  "  His  gray 
eyes  would  flash  fire  when  speaking  against  slav 
ery,  or  look  volumes  of  love  when  speaking  of 
liberty,  justice,  and  the  progress  of  mankind;" 
"His  eyes  had  a  far-away  look;'  "The  saddest 
face  that  ever  was  seen  —  sadness  seemed  to  drip 
from  him  as  he  walked ; '  "A  sad,  preoccupied, 
far-away  look,  so  intense  that  he  seemed  to  be  in  a 
trance;"  "Inexpressible  sadness  in  his  eyes,  with 
a  far-away  look,  as  if  they  were  searching  for 
something  they  had  seen  long,  long  years  ago;" 
"Melancholy  eyes  that  seemed  to  wander  far 
away." 

The  rapid  change  of  expression  in  Lincoln's 
eyes  and  face  is  thus  set  forth:  — 

"His  little  gray  eyes  flashed  in  a  face  aglow 
with  the  fire  of  his  profound  thoughts,  and  his 
uneasy  movements  and  diffident  manner  sunk 
themselves  beneath  the  waves  of  righteous  indig 
nation  that  came  sweeping  over  him."  "His  eyes 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  15 

flashed  fire,  he  was  no  longer  homely  and  un 
gainly,  his  whole  appearance  changed  in  an  in 
stant,  his  body  was  transformed,  and  his  face  was 
lighted  with  a  mysterious  inner  light."  "  His 
eyes  flashed  with  pleasure,  and  his  sad  counte 
nance  lighted  up  and  became  almost  beautiful." 
"The  dull,  listless  expression  dropped  like  a  mask. 
The  melancholy  shadow  disappeared  in  a  twink 
ling.  The  eyes  began  to  sparkle,  the  mouth  to 
smile,  and  the  whole  countenance  was  wreathed 
in  animation."  "  When  affected  by  humor,  sympa 
thy,  or  admiration  for  some  heroic  deed  or  sacri 
fice  for  the  right,  his  face  changed  in  an  instant, 
the  hard  lines  faded  out  of  it,  and  the  emotion 
seemed  to  diffuse  itself  all  over  him.  His  sad  face 
of  a  sudden  became  radiant;  he  seemed  like  one 
inspired." 

Several  of  Lincoln's  friends  to  whom  I  wrote 
for  early  photographs  of  him  answered  that  they 
had  none,  because  no  picture  represented  the  light 
that  was  in  his  eyes  when  he  was  listening  or  speak 
ing,  and  in  such  aspects  alone  did  they  wish  to 
remember  him.  And  one  added,  "  It  was  then 
only  that  he  was  in  the  world." 

Of  Lincoln's  naturalness,  native  dignity,  and 
grace,  this  is  said :  - 


16  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

« He  had  perfect  naturalness,  a  native  grace 
which  never  failed  to  shine  through  his  words  and 
acts."  «  He  had  the  gentleness  of  the  unspoiled 
child  of  nature."  "  He  had  a  dignity  of  bearing 
and  character  that  commanded  respect."  "  Nat 
ural  grandeur  of  demeanor."  "A  natural  gen 
tleman."  "  He  had  a  wonderful  countenance, 
easy  dignity,  and  ever-present  tact."  "He  always 
maintained  a  singular  dignity  and  reserve  with 
out  the  least  effort."  "  He  was  awkward,  but  it 
was  the  awkwardness  of  nature,  which  is  akin  to 
grace." 

When  I  asked  a  Boston  man,  the  closest  ob 
server  in  matters  of  men  and  art  I  ever  knew,  if 
he  thought,  as  most  people  did,  that  Lincoln  was 
awkward,  he  replied  :  "  Yes,  he  was  awkward,  but 
with  an  elegance  that  a  king  might  envy  and  com 
mon  men  despise.  He  moved  with  an  ease  that 
was  in  the  highest  degree  impressive,  and  with 
a  grace  of  nature  that  would  have  become  a 


woman.' 


There  is  no  difference  of  opinion  in  regard  to 
the  change  that  came  over  Lincoln's  appearance 
from  the  time  he  began  to  address  an  audience 
until  he  became  warmed  up.  At  first  he  ap 
peared  awkward,  diffident, and  uneasy;  but  as  soon 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  17 

as  he  got  hold  of  his  subject,  or  it  had  got  hold 
of  him,  he  was  another  man.  He  seemed  in 
spired,  and  was  immensely  imposing  and  dignified. 
He  is  thus  described :  "  The  act  of  expressing  a 
great  sentiment  or  concluding  a  fine  period  trans 
formed  Lincoln's  awkwardness,  uncouthness,  and 
boorishness  into  beauty  and  nobility  of  bearing. 
In  making  a  speech  on  a  subject  that  deeply 
interested  him,  he  often  quivered  all  over  with 
emotion,  nearly  stifling  his  utterance." 

Of  Lincoln's  stretching-up  capacity,  or  vertical 
elasticity,  there  is  also  no  difference  of  opinion, 
and  this,  as  the  artist  knows,  is  a  quality  marked 
only  in  people  of  the  highest  physical  construc 
tion.  That  he  could  stretch  up  to  an  unwonted 
height,  or  appear  to  do  so,  is  well  authenticated. 

In  interesting  conjunction  with  Lincoln's  facial 
and  physical  transformations, —  the  ready  expres 
sion  of  a  rich  and  sensitive  emotional  nature, - 
may  be  placed  his  great  muscular  strength  and 
activity,  and  the  terrible  character  of  his  anger 
when  aroused  by  injustice  to  himself  or  to  a  friend, 
though  he  was  averse  to  any  combative  exercise  of 
his  strength  save  in  a  friendly  wrestle,  or  to  help 
some  one  in  trouble. 

Now  we  come  to  the  crucial  questions :     Do 


1 8  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

not  the  beautiful  character  of  Lincoln's  eyes,  the 
sudden  and  peculiarly  impressive  change  in  his 
facial  expression,  his  unusual  power  of  stretch 
ing  up,  or  vertical  elasticity,  and  the  rapidity  and 
strength  of  his  bodily  movement,  suggest  the  idea 
that  there  were  admirable  qualities  in  his  physi 
cal  make-up  not  included  in  the  popular  belief? 
It  seems  to  me  that  these  things  suggest  a  splen 
didly  sensitive,  responsive,  and  powerful  system 
of  nerves ;  a  muscular  organization  of  a  rare  and 
superior  kind;  and  that  instead  of  high  intel 
lectual  and  emotional  qualities  incased  in  an  ill- 
assorted  body,  it  will  be  found  that  there  was  an 
admirable  body,  and  a  deep  harmony  between 
the  outer  and  inner  man.  An  examination  of 
the  portraits  of  Lincoln  will  help  to  make  this 
apparent. 

It  is  doubtful  if  any  personage  in  history  has 
had  as  many  portraits  made  from  life  in  the  short 
space  of  seven  years  —  by  human  workers  in  oil 
and  clay,  by  sunlight  in  photographs,  ambrotypes, 
and  tintypes  —  as  Abraham  Lincoln.  It  began 
during  the  Douglas  debates  in  1858,  became  a 
campaign  necessity  in  Springfield  the  second  day 
after  his  nomination,  and  continued  almost  with- 


* 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  19 

out  interruption  until  forty  days  before  he  breathed 
his  last. 

Mr.  L.  W.  Volk,  a  Chicago  sculptor,  was  the 
first  artist  to  whom  Lincoln  sat  for  his  portrait,- 
a  bust, —  finished  a  month  or  two  before  the  Chi 
cago  convention.  An  event  occurred  in  the  pro 
gress  of  making  this  bust  that  may  be  justly  called 
the  second  most  important  one  in  the  history  of 
American  portraiture,  —  the  taking  of  a  most  per 
fect  mask  of  the  future  President's  face,  —  the 
other  being  a  like  process  with  the  face  of  Wash 
ington  in  1785,  by  the  French  sculptor  Houdon. 
This  Lincoln  mask  is  the  first  reliable  contri 
bution  to  the  material  upon  which  a  safe  exami 
nation  of  the  forms  of  his  face  can  be  made.  The 
photographs,  ambrotypes,  and  tintypes  made  be 
fore  and  after  he  became  President  are  also  valu 
able  contributions.  Those,  with  casts  of  both  his 
hands,  taken  a  few  days  after  his  nomination,  com 
plete  what  there  is  of  unquestionable  material  by 
which  to  judge  of  the  character  of  Lincoln's  face, 
figure,  and  physical  movement. 

~  It  is  to  Frenchmen  that  the  credit  of  first  see-  x 
ing  the  true  beauty  of  the  life  mask,  of  appreciat 
ing  it  and  describing  it,  is  due.    When,  in  1877, 
I  took  a  plaster  copy  to  the  oldest  bronze  founder 


20  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

in  Paris,  to  get  it  cast  in  bronze,  I  put  it  down 
on  a  table  side  by  side  with  a  mask  of  the  Abbe 
Lamennais.  The  first  words  of  the  founder  were: 
"What  a  beautiful  face!  Why,  it's  more  beauti 
ful  and  has  more  character  than  the  Abbe's,  and 
we  think  that  is  the  handsomest  one  in  France ! 
What  an  extraordinary  construction,  and  what 
fine  forms  it  has ! '  Then  he  asked  who  it  was, 
and  added,  "I  shall  take  pleasure  in  showing  it 
to  So-and-so,"  naming  several  of  the  principal 
sculptors  in  Paris  for  whom  he  did  work. 

Some  weeks  after,  when  I  went  to  get  the 
bronze  copy,  the  founder  told  me  that  these  sculp 
tors  and  others  had  seen  the  Lincoln  mask  and  ex 
pressed  themselves  in  the  most  appreciative  terms 
of  what  they  saw  in  it.  Here  in  substance  is  what 
they  said:  "It  is  unusual  in  general  construction,  it 
has  a  new  and  interesting  character,  and  its  planes 
are  remarkably  beautiful  and  subtle.  If  it  belongs 
to  any  type,  and  we  know  of  none  such,  it  must 
be  a  wonderful  specimen  of  that  type."  Like 
things  were  said  of  it  by  other  French  artists,  as 
I  took  pains  to  show  it  for  examination.  I  lent 
the  mask  and  a  number  of  Lincoln  photographs 
to  the  best  French  genre  sculptor  of  modern  times, 
for  several  months,  for  him  to  see  what  he  could 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  21 

get  out  of  it  in  making  a  face  in  clay.  When  he 
got  through  he  made  these  observations :  "  I  can 
do  nothing  with  that  head,  and  I  doubt  if  any 

one  in  these  times  can.    The   more   I   studied   it, 

( 

the  more  difficulties  I  found.  *The  subtle  charac 
ter  of  its  forms  is  beyond  belief.  There  is  no  face 

like  it."j 
s 

Fremiet  was  particularly  interested.  He  said, 
among  other  things:  "It  seems  impossible  that 
a  new  country  like  yours  should  produce  such  a 
face.  It  is  unique."  Then  he  asked,  "  Do  you 
know  anything  about  the  physique  of  your  mar 
tyr  President?  He  must  have  been  tall  and  slim, 
having  little  flesh,  and  very  alert  in  action."  As 
I  was  then  making  some  sketches  of  a  statuette, 
based  upon  a  very  little  knowledge  of  Lincoln's 
physical  appearance,  Fremiet' s  suggestions  were 
of  great  value,  for  I  knew  him  to  be  a  learned 
ethnologist.  He  then  recommended  me  to  get 
for  a  model  a  man  of  the  neighborhood  who  was 
tall  and  slim,  but  very  compactly  built.  His  height 
was  six  feet,  four  inches, —  the  same,  I  learned 
long  afterwards,  as  that  of  Lincoln.  At  the  close 
of  our  conversation,  Fremiet  said,  "  You  have  in 
hand  a  wonderfully  interesting  subject.  I  envy 
you." 


22  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

No  word  was  uttered  or  suggested  by  any  of 
these  persons  indicating  consideration  of  the  mask 
from  a  popular,  or  so-called  "  classic,"  point  of 
view ;  it  was  invariably  looked  at  from  the  point 
of  view  of  individual  character,  as  an  original  and 
interesting  piece  of  facial  construction,  and  ad 
mired  for  the  harmony  of  the  face  with  itself. 
There  was  no  reference  to  ugliness,  coarseness,  or 
flabbiness  of  form.  It  was  the  same  with  the  pho 
tographs  shown  to  them. 

A  short  detailed  review  of  the  mask  would  be 
something  like  this:  a  projecting  face  with  un 
usual  vigor  and  contrasts  of  planes ;  long,  large, 
protruding  ears;  strong,  angular  lower  jaw,  and 
high  chin;  all  lines  of  face  muscular  or  bony, 
strongly,  firmly,  and  delicately  marked ;  the  fore 
head  wrinkled  to  the  roots  of  the  hair ;  the  full 
ness  above  and  immediately  back  of  the  temples 
very  rich  and  firm,  giving  not  only  an  important 
contrast  to  the  line  of  the  face  below,  but  finish 
ing  that  part  of  the  head  with  a  commanding  form 
and  outline. 

The  profile  is  also  unusual,  in  the  character  of 
the  lines  and  in  their  construction:  first,  the  full 
line  of  the  forehead,  carried  from  the  top  of  the 
nose  upward;  second,  the  projecting  nose,  prac- 


(••*?- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  23 

tically  straight,  and  the  distance  from  its  end 
back  to  the  upper  lip,  which  is  rather  more  than 
an  eighth  of  an  inch  greater  than  with  ordinary 
noses.  The  nose  is  thick  in  its  body  and  wide  on 
the  top  when  looked  at  in  front,  and  thus  helps 
to  make  a  harmonious  face,  because  it  catches  so 
much  light.  The  distance  from  the  top  of  the 
nose,  when  seen  in  profile,  to  the  inner  corner 
of  the  eye,  is  again  unusual.  The  end  of  the  nose 
appears  almost  blunt,  but  its  outline,  when  care 
fully  examined,  is  very  delicate.  The  skin,  so  far 
as  can  be  judged  from  a  somewhat  worn  mask,  is 
not  marked  into  small  sections  as  in  most  skins, 
but  is  comparatively  smooth,  and  indented  with 
little  holes,  like  enlarged  pores.  The  firmness  of 
the  skin  and  muscles  is  evidenced  by  the  correct 
ness  of  the  forms  of  the  mask,  as  there  is  not  the 
slightest  indication  that  there  was  any  change  in 
them  made  by  .the  weight  of  the  plaster.  The 
surface-forms  of  the  forehead  present  an  extraor 
dinary  variety,  many  of  them  being  very  subtle, 
yet  decisive,  and  running  into  each  other  with  a 
delicacy  rarely  seen  in  foreheads  of  males.  It  was 
this  peculiarity  and  variety  of  forms  of  the  entire 
face  that  made  it  difficult  for  the  French  sculptor 
to  reproduce. 


24  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

The  skin  accords  with  Herndon's  statement 
that  it  had  a  smooth  and  leathery  surface.  It  is 
this  kind  of  skin  that  gives  such  incisive  direct 
ness  and  decision  to  all  the  lines  of  the  face.  They 
have  a  character  all  their  own.  This  fact  is  more 
evident  in  the  stronger  lines,  such  as  those  running 
down  from  the  wings  of  the  nose,  and  the  sunken 
ones  just  back  of  them.  In  contrast  to  these  lines 
may  be  noticed  a  dullness  of  form  about  the 
wings  of  the  nose. 

The  mask  is  especially  living,  in  that  it  strongly 
suggests  Lincoln's  undemonstrative  self-conscious 
ness,  as  well  as  a  knightly  readiness,  seen  in  the  pho 
tographs  taken  immediately  after  his  nomination 
for  the  Presidency.  The  bronze  copy  shows  these 
qualities  with  pleasing  gravity.  There  is  another 
rare  quality  about  it,  as  it  bears  the  marks  of  both 
youth  and  age.  Lincoln  was  in  his  fifty-second 
year.  The  mask  is  in  short  a  perfect  reproduc 
tion  of  Lincoln's  face,  and  greatly  beautiful  in  its 
human  style  and  gravity. 

The  large,  thick,  and  protruding  under  lip  in 
jures  the  general  harmony  and  delicacy  of  the  face 
in  the  estimation  of  some  keen  observers,  though 
not  disturbing  or  lessening  the  very  sensitive  line 
of  mouth.  These  persons  connect  this  feature  with 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  25 

Lincoln's  lack  of  sensibility  in  many  matters,  his 
absolute  indifference  to  art,  to  the  nicer  comforts 
of  physical  life,  and  with  a  certain  want  of  delicacy 
in  observing  the  minor  customs  of  a  refined  state 
of  society.  In  other  words,  they  interpret  it  as  his 
face-mark  of  a  certain  physical  obtuseness.  Were 
it  not  for  the  high,  firm  chin,  powerful  jaw,  and 
decided  upper  lip,  all  forming  a  well-proportioned 
combination,  and  thus  reducing  the  lower  lip  to  a 
less  obtrusive  effect,  this  member  of  the  face  would 
indeed  seem  unpleasantly  large.  Still,  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  the  right  kind  of  a  thick  lower 
lip  is  a  physiognomical  mark  of  sensitiveness  and 
tenderness  of  nature. 

The  Lincoln  mask,  as  may  be  seen  herein,  does 
not  lose  in  character  by  a  comparison  with  the  pro 
file  view  of  Washington.  The  force  of  Lincoln's 
individuality  in  such  a  connection  is  alone  suffi 
cient  to  stamp  it  as  a  wonderful  one.  Washing 
ton's  head  is  a  perfect  example  of  its  type. 

The  casts  of  Lincoln's  hands  were  made  a  few 
days  after  his  nomination  for  the  Presidency. 
They  are  large,  long  hands.  The  first  phalanx  of 
the  middle  finger  is  nearly  half  an  inch  longer  than 
that  of  an  ordinary  hand.  The  bones  are  finely 
shaped,  not  unusually  large,  muscles  thin,  strongly 


26  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

defined  in  their  own  construction  and  in  their  re 
lations,  fingernails  of  good  form  and  of  ordinary 
length.  The  joints  are  very  supple.  Were  it  not 
for  the  length  of  the  fingers,  the  shape  of  the  nails, 
the  resemblance  of  the  knuckles  and  the  move 
ment  of  the  muscles  on  the  inside  of  the  right 
hand,  one  would  doubt  that  it  was  the  mate  of 
the  other.  In  contrast  and  variety  of  form,  the  left 
hand  is  as  fine  and  original  as  is  the  mask;  and 
both  mask  and  hands  are  distinguished  for  exacti 
tude  of  form. 

The  action  of  the  folded  fingers  of  the  left  hand  is 
particularly  noticeable,  because  it  is  so  definite  and 
complete,  made  with  a  purpose.  This  seemingly 
minor  detail  is,  after  all,  representative  of  Lincoln's 
whole  nature.  It  is  an  habitual  one,  as  is  the  ten 
dency  to  fold  in  the  fingers.  This  concentration, 
or  keeping  together  of  the  members  of  the  body, 
is  seen  in  nearly  every  one  of  the  sixty  portraits 
from  life. 

There  is  an  extra  fullness  of  the  back  of  the 
right  hand,  in  spite  of  the  firm  grip  on  the  object 
it  holds,  caused,  Mr.  Volk  says,  by  shaking  hands 
with  several  hundreds  of  people  just  before  the 
cast  was  made. 

Nearest  physiognomically  to  the  mask  are  two 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  27 

photographs,  taken  at  different  times,  one  a  little 
more  and  the  other  a  little  less  than  profile.1  Ex 
cept  for  the  nose  and  the  way  the  head  sets  on  the 
neck  and  shoulders,  these  heads  would  hardly  be 
taken  as  belonging  to  the  same  person.  There  are 
only  four  measurements  that  distinguish  Lincoln's 
head  and  face  from  any  other  good  head  and  face. 
First,  the  distance  from  the  end  of  the  nose  back 
to  the  upper  lip ;  second,  the  length  and  depth 
of  the  mouth  from  the  profile  line  backwards ; 
third,  the  distance  from  the  wing  of  the  nose  up 
to  the  inside  corner  of  the  eye ;  and  fourth,  from 
the  eye  up  to  a  horizontal  line  passing  through 
both  eyebrows.  All  these  measurements  are  im 
portant  and  significant.  The  distance  from  the 
top  of  the  nose  just  below  where  it  joins  the  fore 
head,  down  to  the  inside  corner  of  the  eye,  is  a 
noticeable  measurement.  Another  constructive 
distinction  of  Lincoln's  face  consists  in  the  slight 
setting  forward  of  the  upper  two  thirds  of  the 
profile,  beyond  that  found  in  most  good  faces, — 
one  of  the  structural  reasons  for  the  superiority 
of  the  best  Greek  faces  over  all  others.  These, 
with  the  heavy,  projecting,  and  easily  moving 
eyebrows,  make  a  combination  of  distances  and 

1  See  page  94. 


28  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

forms  of  imposing  distinction.  All  these  construc 
tive  effects  strike  the  observer  unconsciously,  and 
emphasize  the  effect  of  the  eyes  themselves.  The 
appearance,  to  the  ordinary  observer,  of  "  deep- 
set  eyes "  is  due  more  to  the  unusual  fullness  and 
fine  forms  around  than  to  their  being  further  back 
than  in  most  countenances.  When  we  add  to  this 
their  extraordinary  emotional  action,  we  get  some 
explanation  of  their  wonderful  effect,  so  often 
described,  upon  the  most  casual  observer.  We 
shall  appreciate  this  part  of  Lincoln's  face  more 
fully  in  the  front-view  photographs. 

It  is  not  alone  the  measurements  but  the  char 
acter  of  the  forms  between  them  that  make  Lin 
coln's  face  and  head  unique.  The  prominence  of 
the  cheek  bones  is  due  more  to  an  absence  of  fat 
and  full  muscle  than  to  unusual  size  of  bone.  The 
character  of  the  facial  muscles,  thin,  firm,  and  elas 
tic,  is  in  accordance  with  Lincoln's  lightweight  for 
a  man  of  his  height,  —  from  one  hundred  and  sixty 
to  one  hundred  and  eighty  pounds,  —  his  great 
strength  and  quickness  of  movement  when  excited, 
and  his  actual  muscular  construction  as  given  by 
Herndon,  which  the  latter  called,  with  a  good  deal 
of  truth,  a  set  of  sinews,  or  extended  tendons.  It 
all  indicates  economy  of  construction,  and  agrees 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  29 

with   the  descriptions   given    of  the   economical 
workings  of  his  mind. 

The  best  front  view  of  Lincoln  is  from  a  photo 
graph  asserted  to  have  been  taken  March  9,  1 864,' 
at  the  same  time  a  similar  view  was  made  of  Grant's 
face,  and  on  the  afternoon  of  the  day  that  the  lat 
ter  received  his  commission  as  Lieutenant-General. 
As  a  whole  it  is  probably  the  most  impressively 
proportioned  picture  ever  taken  of  Lincoln.  It  is 
all  strange,  in  no  respect  like  any  other  head.  It 
is  a  large  one,  not  in  inches,  but  in  construction, 
-  a  head  that  will  hold  its  own  in  space,  in  the 
open  air.  In  this  rare  respect  it  belongs  to  the  few 
faces  that  are  inherently  decorative.  It  must  be 
estimated  by  a  standard  authorized  by  itself.  No 
such  eyes  were  ever  seen  in  mortal  head,  and  no 
such  setting  was  ever  given  to  any  other  eyes.  In 
all  the  photographs  we  see  that  the  eyes  and  their 
framework  confirm  this  statement.  Careful  ob 
servation  shows  that  the  muscles  and  skin  around 
the  eyes  are  very  tender  and  sensitive,  which  may 
partly  account  for  their  unusual  action  in  express 
ing  emotion. 

One  of  his  most  interesting  photographs  is  that 
taken  seated  on  the  2d  of  November,  the  Sunday 

1  See  page  1 10. 


3o  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

before  the  delivery  of  the  Gettysburg  speech.1 
On  the  table  at  hand  is  a  paper  containing  Ever 
ett's  oration.  Until  I  saw  this  photograph  in  Wash 
ington,^  December,  1874,!  supposed  that  Lincoln 
was  as  popularly  described.  When  I  first  saw  it  I 
was  amazed  at  the  difference  between  it  and  cur 
rent  tradition.  It  struck  me  as  the  most  original, 
easy,  dignified,  and  impressive  representation  of  a 
man  in  a  sitting  position  I  had  ever  seen.  Years 
of  looking  at  it  and  studying  it  in  comparison 
with  many  others  of  the  eminent  men  of  mod 
ern  times  have  confirmed  that  impression.  Still 
greater  confirmation  I  found  in  the  opinions  of 
three  of  the  greatest  sculptors  of  modern  times, 
—  Fremiet,  Rodin,  and  Aube;  they  were  aston 
ished  at  its  original  and  imposing  presence.  "It 
is  a  new  man;  he  has  tremendous  character," 
they  said.  Everything  about  this  picture  is  sur 
prisingly  suggestive  and  admirable.  The  head  in 
its  massiveness,  the  way  it  is  poised  on  the  shoul 
ders,  the  lines  of  the  legs  and  arms,  and  especially 
the  bend  of  the  body,  in  spite  of  the  coverings, 
are  firm,  fine,  and  easy.  The  kneepans  are  not 
over  large  or  shapeless,  nor  do  the  hands  show  any 
incongruity  in  mass,  line,  or  movement.  There  is 

1  See  frontispiece. 


/i  sy  ^ 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  31 

nothing  in  the  hang  of  the  clothes  or  their  lines  and 
folds  that  indicates  anything  but  a  well-shaped 
form  beneath.  No  monarch  ever  sat  with  more 
natural  grace  and  dignity. 

The  simple,  easy  line  of  the  hand  on  the  table, 
and  that  made  by  the  foot  and  leg  and  the  bend  of 
the  knee,  suggest  quite  the  opposite  of  clumsy  and 
awkwardly  constructed  or  moving  articulations. 
It  is  a  great  portrait,  —  a  great  ready-made  statue 
or  picture.  As  such  it  ranks  with  the  best  portraits 
in  any  art,  and  as  far  as  I  know  it  is  absolutely 
unique ;  again,  as  such,  it  means  that  Lincoln's 
mind  and  body  not  only  worked  together  in  per 
fect  physical  harmony,  but  exemplified  a  dignified 
and  gracious  ease.  He  made  his  own  statue.  It 
is  his  actual  presence,  the  very  life  of  the  man. 
A  statue  is  no  more  or  less  than  a  study  of  physi 
ognomy  with  reference  to  the  effect  of  light  upon 
it  as  reproduced  in  marble,  stone,  or  bronze. 

Lincoln  is  dressed  in  modern  costume,  a  costume 
condemned  by  every  one,  and  especially  when  re 
produced  in  sculpture.  Yet  I  doubt  if  one  person  in 
a  thousand  would  think  of  the  costume  when  look 
ing  at  this  portrait.  The  simple  fact  is  that  Lincoln's 
body  completely  dominates  his  clothes,  and  would 
continue  to  do  so  in  sculpture  if  properly  executed. 


32  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

There  are  many  other  significant  details  in  this 
sitting  portrait,  of  which  a  few  may  be  mentioned. 
The  legs  are  kept  well  together.  Every  action  of 
legs,  arms,  hands,  and  feet  is  decisive,  completing 
its  intention,  and  all  in  natural  harmony.  This  is 
a  very  important  and  significant  fact,  so  much  so 
that  it  may  be  taken  as  an  ample  starting-point 
for  a  full  consideration  of  Lincoln's  intellectual 
construction.  So  definite  is  the  completion  of  in 
tention  that  the  right  foot  is  placed  fully  upon  the 
floor,  and  the  full  length  of  the  other  foot  is  also 
prone  upon  the  floor.  The  position  of  these  feet 
shows  not  only  a  flexible  but  a  well-formed  articu 
lation.  This  flexibility  of  ankle  joints  permits  the 
left  foot  to  fall  down,  and  thus  not  only  saves  it 
from  being  awkward  by  pointing  up  into  the  air, 
as  nine  hundred  and  ninety-nine  feet  in  a  thou 
sand  would  do,  but  makes  a  fine  line  in  connection 
with  the  leg.  The  size  and  character  of  Lincoln's 
feet,  as  shown  through  his  boots,  are  in  admirable 
accord  with  his  body.  They  are  well  and  forcibly 
formed,  and  of  noticeable  importance  as  a  con 
structive  fact. 

In  none  of  the  sitting  views  is  there  any  sign 
of  a  disposition  to  sprawl  or  spread  around,  as  the 
majority  of  men  do  when  sitting.  No  member, 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  33 

like  the  hands,  for  instance,  is  obtrusive.  These 
facts  indicate  natural  elegance,  high  style  in  bod 
ily  action,  and  a  concentrative  physical  economy 
in  accordance  with  the  beauty  and  character  of 
Lincoln's  mind. 

The  photograph  of  Lincoln  and  Little  Tad ' 
shows  the  President's  great  style  of  hand  and  its 
splendid  articulation  with  the  wrist.  A  hand  fit 
not  only  for  the  first  and  greatest  American,  but 
in  every  way  worthy  to  write,  as  he  did,  literature 
that  is  nothing  less  than  biblical  in  its  majestic 
simplicity.  This  view  obviously  depicts  a  per 
fectly  natural  position,  taken  by  Lincoln  without 
the  aid  of  the  photographer.  He  is  completely 
together,  unconscious,  and  absolutely  indifferent 
to  anything  outside  of  himself. 

From  a  point  of  view  of  physical  and  mental 
harmony  of  an  unobtrusive  and  self-centred  kind, 
its  simple  variety  and  contrast  of  planes  betoken 
ing  to  an  extreme  the  humble  character  of  the 
man,  the  photograph  of  Lincoln  in  McClellan's 
tent*  is,  to  me,  the  most  unusual  and  strangely 
interesting  of  all  the  pictures  ever  taken  of  him 
in  a  sitting  position.  It  is  an  extreme  illustration 
of  good  physical  centralization.  If  the  first  sitting 

1  See  page  122.  '  See  page  82. 


34 

photograph  that  we  have  examined  is  as  a  ready- 
made  statue,  marvelous  in  its  composition  and 
more  than  kingly  in  its  ease  and  dignity,  this  one 
is  sculpturesque  in  its  perfection  as  a  bas-relief. 
Yet  how  humanly  expressive  it  is  in  the  simplicity 
and  directness  of  the  attention  which  the  Presi 
dent  is  bestowing  upon  his  companion.  An  essay 
could  be  written  about  it. 

The  world's  great  statues  and  figure-pieces  in 
painting  are  made  like  great  orations,  great  poems, 
and  great  judicial  disquisitions,  upon  the  lines, 
and  in  harmony  with  the  authoritative  divisions,  of 
their  subjects.  Like  all  high,  inspired  productions, 
they  hide  themselves  save  to  the  deep  and  sincere 
student.  The  sitting  photographs  of  Lincoln  that 
we  have  rapidly  examined  are  akin  to  them,  and 
merit  the  same  grave  scientific  and  artistic  con 
sideration. 

We  shall  now  examine  some  photographs  that 
will  tax  our  best  discrimination  and  appeal  to 
our  most  considerate  judgment,  —  pictures  of 
such  extraordinary  significance  that,  to  justly 
understand  and  appreciate  them,  we  shall  be 
obliged  to  put  aside  our  habitual  standard  of 
judgment  and  pay  tribute  to  the  inherent  au 
thority  of  their  own  physical  and  mental  con- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  35 

struction.      They  represent  the  President  at  An- 
tietam  headquarters.1 

These   photographs,  with  two  others   that  we 
shall  consider,  are  the  only  ones  known  to  be  in 
existence  showing  him  at  full  length  in  a  standing  t 
position. 

At  first  sight  Lincoln  appears  strange  and  even 
grotesque,  with  his  unusual  height,  narrow  shoul 
ders,  long  arms  hanging  so  listlessly  by  his  sides, 
and  that  oddest  of  tall  hats.  The  great  majority 
of  people  would  be  strongly  tempted  to  laugh  at 
this  strange  figure  standing  there  so  absolutely 
alone.  Few,  if  any,  would  think  of  making  it  a 
subject  of  careful  study,  or  in  any  way  regarding 
it  as  vitally  related  to  the  intellectual  and  human 
frame  of  one  of  the  most  wonderful  beings  that 
has  appeared  upon  the  earth,  —  a  weird  and  mys 
terious  being,  who  came  into  the  world  against 
convention,  who  performed  functions  as  unique  as 
they  were  far-reaching,  and  who  left  the  world  by 
the  old  mysteriously  cruel  road  so  often  trod  by 
its  noblest. 

He  reminds  one  of  the  isolated  figures  in  archaic 
sculpture,  —  straight,  stiff",  and  uninteresting.  But 
if  we  examine  closely,  we  shall  see  that  Lincoln's 

1  See  pages  70,  88. 


36  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

position  is  not  only  the  sum  of  simplicity,  but 
that  his  straightness  is  easy  and  unconscious,  —  all 
again  illustrating  the  economy  of  his  bodily  action, 
the  natural  tendency  toward  the  simplest  move 
ments,  and  a  reliance  upon  himself.  Even  when 
excited  in  speaking,  he  made  few  gestures,  so  few 
that  many  say  he  made  none.  In  walking  there 
were  no  useless  movements,  and  in  sitting  he  got 
himself  closely  together,  as  we  have  already  seen. 
Herndon,  who  studied  his  partner  with  more  per 
sistence  than  any  one,  says  that  he  always  stood 
squarely  on  both  feet,  both  legs  under  him,  never 
one  ahead  of  the  other,  and  that  he  never  leaned 
on  or  touched  anything  while  speaking.  In  this 
also  the  body  of  Lincoln  was  in  harmony  with  his 
mental  action.  These  figures  are  the  most  inter 
esting  ones  I  have  ever  seen  of  a  man  standing. 

The  pictures  of  Lincoln  at  Antietam,  and  with 
the  Generals  of  the  Army  of  the  Potomac,  give  a 
sufficient  opportunity  to  compare  Lincoln's  un 
conscious  simplicity  of  vertical  structure  and  pose 
with  a  dozen  or  more  generals  and  civilians,  not 
one  of  whom  is  not  more  or  less  conscious,  and 
trying  without  success  to  stand  well. 

An  added  and  almost  pathetic  interest  gathers 
around  this  form  when  seen  isolated  from  any 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  37 

other.  Its  suggestiveness  multiplies  until  it  be 
comes  a  text  for  a  discourse  upon  the  entire  char 
acter  of  the  man,  its  sadness,  its  pathos,  its  isola 
tion.  It  seems  like  a  solitary  dolmen  in  a  deserted 
and  barren  plain,  that  has  withstood  the  ravaging 
decay  of  centuries.  As  Lincoln's  whole  nature 
presents  to  history  the  most  intricate  and  mys 
terious  individual  problem,  so  the  photographs 
we  have  seen  represent  the  only  new  physical 
organization  of  which  we  have  any  correct  know 
ledge  contributed  by  the  New  World  to  the  eth 
nographic  consideration  of  mankind. 

TRUMAN   H.   BARTLETT. 


THE  HAND  OF  LINCOLN 

LOOK  on  this  cast,  and  know  the  hand 

That  bore  a  nation  in  its  hold : 
From  this  mute  witness  understand 

What  Lincoln  was, —  how  large  of  mould 

The  man  who  sped  the  woodman's  team, 
And  deepest  sunk  the  ploughman's  share, 

And  pushed  the  laden  raft  astream, 
Of  fate  before  him  unaware. 

This  was  the  hand  that  knew  to  swing 

The  axe  —  since  thus  would  Freedom  train 

Her  son  —  and  made  the  forest  ring, 

And  drove  the  wedge,  and  toiled  amain. 

Firm  hand,  that  loftier  office  took, 
A  conscious  leader's  will  obeyed, 

And,  when  men  sought  his  word  and  look, 
With  steadfast  might  the  gathering  swayed. 

No  courtier's,  toying  with  a  sword, 
Nor  minstrel's,  laid  across  a  lute; 

A  chief's,  uplifted  to  the  Lord 

When  all  the  kings  of  earth  were  mute ! 

The  hand  of  Anak,  sinewed  strong, 
The  ringers  that  on  greatness  clutch ; 

Yet,  lo  !   the  marks  their  lines  along 
Of  one  who  strove  and  suffered  much. 


42  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

For  here  in  knotted  cord  and  vein 
I  trace  the  varying  chart  of  years ; 

I  know  the  troubled  heart,  the  strain, 
The  weight  of  Atlas  —  and  the  tears. 

Again  I  see  the  patient  brow 

That  palm  erewhile  was  wont  to  press ; 

And  now  'tis  furrowed  deep,  and  now 
Made  smooth  with  hope  and  tenderness. 

For  something  of  a  formless  grace 
This  moulded  outline  plays  about ; 

A  pitying  flame,  beyond  our  trace, 
Breathes  like  a  spirit,  in  and  out,  — 

The  love  that  cast  an  aureole 

Round  one  who,  longer  to  endure, 

Called  mirth  to  ease  his  ceaseless  dole, 
Yet  kept  his  nobler  purpose  sure. 

Lo,  as  I  gaze,  the  statured  man, 

Built  up  from  yon  large  hand,  appears : 

A  type  that  Nature  wills  to  plan 
But  once  in  all  a  people's  years. 

What  better  than  this  voiceless  cast 

To  tell  of  such  a  one  as  he, 
Since  through  its  living  semblance  passed 

The  thought  that  bade  a  race  be  free ! 

EDMUND  CLARENCE  STEDMAN. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 
A   BIOGRAPHICAL   ESSAY 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN 


O  American  can  study  the  char 
acter  and  career  of  Abraham 
Lincoln  without  being  car 
ried  away  by  sentimental  emo 
tions.  We  are  always  inclined 
to  idealize  that  which  we  love, 
—  a  state  of  mind  very  unfavorable  to  the  exer 
cise  of  sober  critical  judgment.  It  is  therefore  not 
surprising  that  most  of  those  who  have  written  or 
spoken  on  that  extraordinary  man,  even  while  con 
scientiously  endeavoring  to  draw  a  lifelike  por 
traiture  of  his  being,  and  to  form  a  just  estimate  of 
his  public  conduct,  should  have  drifted  into  more 
or  less  indiscriminating  eulogy,  painting  his  great 
features  in  the  most  glowing  colors,  and  covering 
with  tender  shadings  whatever  might  look  like  a 
blemish. 

But  his  standing  before  posterity  will  not  be 
exalted  by  mere  praise  of  his  virtues  and  abilities, 
nor  by  any  concealment  of  his  limitations  and 
faults.  The  stature  of  the  great  man,  one  of  whose 
peculiar  charms  consisted  in  his  being  so  unlike 


46  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

all  other  great  men,  will  rather  lose  than  gain  by 
the  idealization  which  so  easily  runs  into  the  com 
monplace.  For  it  was  distinctly  the  weird  mixture 
of  qualities  and  forces  in  him,  of  the  lofty  with 
the  common,  the  ideal  with  the  uncouth,  of  that 
which  he  had  become  with  that  which  he  had  not 
ceased  to  be,  that  made  him  so  fascinating  a  char 
acter  among  his  fellow  men,  gave  him  his  singular 
power  over  their  minds  and  hearts,  and  fitted  him 
to  be  the  greatest  leader  in  the  greatest  crisis  of 
our  national  life. 

His  was  indeed  a  marvelous  growth.  The  states 
man  or  the  military  hero  born  and  reared  in  a  log 
cabin  is  a  familiar  figure  in  American  history  ;  but 
we  may  search  in  vain  among  our  celebrities  for 
one  whose  origin  and  early  life  equaled  Abraham 
Lincoln's  in  wretchedness.  He  first  saw  the  light 
in  a  miserable  hovel  in  Kentucky,  on  a  farm  con 
sisting  of  a  few  barren  acres  in  a  dreary  neighbor 
hood  ;  his  father  a  typical  "poor  Southern  white," 
shiftless  and  improvident,  without  ambition  for 
himself  or  his  children,  constantly  looking  for  a 
new  piece  of  land  on  which  he  might  make  a  liv 
ing  without  much  work ;  his  mother,  in  her  youth 
handsome  and  bright,  grown  prematurely  coarse 
in  feature  and  soured  in  mind  by  daily  toil  and 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  47 

care;  the  whole  household  squalid,  cheerless,  and 
utterly  void  of  elevating  inspirations.  Only  when 
the  family  had  "  moved  "  into  the  malarious  back 
woods  of  Indiana,  the  mother  had  died,  and  a 
stepmother,  a  woman  of  thrift  and  energy,  had 
taken  charge  of  the  children,  the  shaggy-headed, 
ragged,  barefooted,  forlorn  boy,  then  seven  years 
old,  "  began  to  feel  like  a  human  being."  Hard 
work  was  his  early  lot.  When  a  mere  boy  he  had 
to  help  in  supporting  the  family,  either  on  his 
father's  clearing,  or  hired  out  to  other  farmers  to 
plough,  or  dig  ditches,  or  chop  wood,  or  drive  ox 
teams ;  occasionally  also  to  "tend  the  baby  "  when 
the  farmer's  wife  was  otherwise  engaged.  He  could 
regard  it  as  an  advancement  to  a  higher  sphere  of 
activity  when  he  obtained  work  in  a  "cross-roads 
store,"  where  he  amused  the  customers  by  his  talk 
over  the  counter;  for  he  soon  distinguished  him 
self  among  the  backwoods  folk  as  one  who  had 
something  to  say  worth  listening  to.  To  win  that 
distinction,  he  had  to  draw  mainly  upon  his  wits ; 
for  while  his  thirst  for  knowledge  was  great,  his 
opportunities  for  satisfying  that  thirst  were  woe 
fully  slender. 

In  the  log  schoolhouse,  which   he   could  visit 
but  little,  he  was  taught  only  reading,  writing,  and 


48  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

elementary  arithmetic.  Among  the  people  of  the 
settlement,  bush  farmers  and  small  tradesmen,  he 
found  none  of  uncommon  intelligence  or  educa 
tion  ;  but  some  of  them  had  a  few  books,  which 
he  borrowed  eagerly.  Thus  he  read  and  re-read 
^Esop's  Fables,  learning  to  tell  stories  with  a  point 
and  to  argue  by  parables;  he  read  Robinson  Cru 
soe,  The  Pilgrim's  Progress,  a  short  history  of  the 
United  States,  and  Weems's  Life  of  Washington. 
To  the  town  constable's  he  went  to  read  the  Re 
vised  Statutes  of  Indiana.  Every  printed  page  that 
fell  into  his  hands  he  would  greedily  devour,  and 
his  family  and  friends  watched  him  with  wonder, 
as  the  uncouth  boy,  after  his  daily  work,  crouched 
in  a  corner  of  the  log  cabin  or  outside  under  a 
tree,  absorbed  in  a  book  while  munching  his  sup 
per  of  corn  bread.  In  this  manner  he  began  to 
gather  some  knowledge,  and  sometimes  he  would 
astonish  the  girls  with  such  startling  remarks  as 
that  the  earth  was  moving  around  the  sun,  and 
not  the  sun  around  the  earth,  and  they  marveled 
where  "Abe  "  could  have  got  such  queer  notions. 
Soon  he  also  felt  the  impulse  to  write,  not  only 
making  extracts  from  books  he  wished  to  remem 
ber,  but  also  composing  little  essays  of  his  own. 
First  he  sketched  these  with  charcoal  on  a  wooden 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  49 

shovel  scraped  white  with  a  drawing-knife,  or  on 
basswood  shingles.  Then  he  transferred  them  to 
paper,  which  was  a  scarce  commodity  in  the  Lin 
coln  household,  taking  care  to  cut  his  expressions 
close,  so  that  they  might  not  cover  too  much  space, 
—  a  style-forming  method  greatly  to  be  com 
mended.  Seeing  boys  put  a  burning  coal  on  the 
back  of  a  wood  turtle,  he  was  moved  to  write  on 
cruelty  to  animals.  Seeing  men  intoxicated  with 
whiskey,  he  wrote  on  temperance.  In  verse-mak 
ing,  too,  he  tried  himself,  and  in  satire  on  persons 
offensive  to  him  or  others,  —  satire  the  rustic  wit 
of  which  was  not  always  fit  for  ears  polite.  Also 
political  thoughts  he  put  upon  paper,  and  some 
of  his  pieces  were  even  deemed  good  enough  for 
publication  in  the  county  weekly. 

Thus  he  won  a  neighborhood  reputation  as 
a  clever  young  man,  which  he  increased  by  his 
performances  as  a  speaker,  not  seldom  drawing 
upon  himself  the  dissatisfaction  of  his  employers 
by  mounting  a  stump  in  the  field,  and  keeping 
the  farm  hands  from  their  work  by  little  speeches 
in  a  jocose  and  sometimes  also  a  serious  vein.  At 
the  rude  social  frolics  of  the  settlement  he  became 
an  important  person,  telling  funny  stories,  mimick 
ing  the  itinerant  preachers  who  had  happened  to 


5o  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

pass  by,  and  making  his  mark  at  wrestling  matches, 
too ;  for  at  the  age  of  seventeen  he  had  attained 
his  full  height,  six  feet  four  inches  in  his  stock 
ings,  if  he  had  any,  and  a  terribly  muscular  clod 
hopper  he  was.  But  he  was  known  never  to  use 
his  extraordinary  strength  to  the  injury  or  hu 
miliation  of  others;  rather  to  do  them  a  kindly 
turn,  or  to  enforce  justice  and  fair  dealing  between 
them.  All  this  made  him  a  favorite  in  backwoods 
society,  although  in  some  things  he  appeared  a 
little  odd  to  his  friends.  Far  more  than  any  of 
them,  he  was  given,  not  only  to  reading,  but  to 
fits  of  abstraction,  to  quiet  musing  with  himself, 
and  also  to  strange  spells  of  melancholy,  from 
which  he  often  would  pass  in  a  moment  to  rollick 
ing  outbursts  of  droll  humor.  But  on  the  whole 
he  was  one  of  the  people  among  whom  he  lived ; 
in  appearance  perhaps  even  a  little  more  uncouth 
than  most  of  them,  —  a  very  tall,  rawboned  youth, 
with  large  features,  dark,  shriveled  skin,  and  re 
bellious  hair  ;  his  arms  and  legs  long,  out  of  pro 
portion  ;  clad  in  deerskin  trousers,  which  from 
frequent  exposure  to  the  rain  had  shrunk  so  as  to 
sit  tightly  on  his  limbs,  leaving  several  inches  of 
bluish  shin  exposed  between  their  lower  end  and 
the  heavy  tan-colored  shoes ;  the  nether  garment 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  51 

held  usually  by  only  one  suspender,  that  was 
strung  over  a  coarse  home-made  shirt;  the  head 
covered  in  winter  with  a  coonskin  cap,  in  sum 
mer  with  a  rough  straw  hat  of  uncertain  shape, 
without  a  band. 

It  is  doubtful  whether  he  felt  himself  much 
superior  to  his  surroundings,  although  he  con 
fessed  to  a  yearning  for  some  knowledge  of  the 
world  outside  of  the  circle  in  which  he  lived. 
This  wish  was  gratified  ;  but  how  ?  At  the  age  of 
nineteen  he  went  down  the  Mississippi  to  New 
Orleans  as  a  flatboat  hand,  temporarily  joining  a 
trade  many  members  of  which  at  that  time  still 
took  pride  in  being  called  "  half  horse  and  half 
alligator."  After  his  return  he  worked  ^nd  lived 
in  the  old  way  until  the  spring  of  1830,  when  his 
father  "  moved  again,"  this  time  to  Illinois ;  and 
on  the  journey  of  fifteen  days  "  Abe  "  had  to  drive 
the  ox  wagon  which  carried  the  household  goods. 
Another  log  cabin  was  built,  and  then,  fencing 
a  field,  Abraham  Lincoln  split  those  historic  rails 
which  were  destined  to  play  so  picturesque  a  part 
in  the  presidential  campaign  twenty-eight  years 
later. 

Having  come  of  age,  Lincoln  left  the  family, 
and  "  struck  out  for  himself."  He  had  "  to  take 


5  2  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

jobs  whenever  he  could  get  them."  The  first  of 
these  carried  him  again  as  a  flatboat  hand  to  New 
Orleans.  There  something  happened  that  made 
a  lasting  impression  upon  his  soul:  he  witnessed 
a  slave  auction.  "  His  heart  bled,"  wrote  one  of 
his  companions;  "said  nothing  much;  was  silent; 
looked  bad.  I  can  say,  knowing  it,  that'  it  was 
on  this  trip  that  he  formed  his  opinion  on  slavery. 
It  run  its  iron  in  him  then  and  there,  May,  1831. 
I  have  heard  him  say  so  often."  Then  he  lived 
several  years  at  New  Salem,  in  Illinois,  a  small 
mushroom  village,  with  a  mill,  some  "stores"  and 
whiskey  shops,  that  rose  quickly,  and  soon  disap 
peared  again.  It  was  a  desolate,  disjointed,  half- 
working,  and  half-loitering  life,  without  any  other 
aim  than  to  gain  food  and  shelter  from  day  to 
day.  He  served  as  pilot  on  a  steamboat  trip,  then 
as  clerk  in  a  store  and  a  mill;  business  failing,  he 
was  adrift  for  some  time.  Being  compelled  to 
measure  his  strength  with  the  chief  bully  of  the 
neighborhood,  and  overcoming  him,  he  became 
a  noted  person  in  that  muscular  community,  and 
won  the  esteem  and  friendship  of  the  ruling  gang 
of  ruffians  to  such  a  degree  that,  when  the  Black 
Hawk  war  broke  out,  they  elected  him,  a  young 
man  of  twenty-three,  captain  of  a  volunteer  com- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  53 

pany,  composed  mainly  of  roughs  of  their  kind. 
He  took  the  field,  and  his  most  noteworthy  deed 
of  valor  consisted,  not  in  killing  an  Indian,  but  in 
protecting  against  his  own  men,  at  the  peril  of  his 
own  life,  the  life  of  an  old  savage  who  had  strayed 
into  his  camp. 

The  Black  Hawk  war  over,  he  turned  to  poli 
tics.  The  step  from  the  captaincy  of  a  volunteer 
company  to  a  candidacy  for  a  seat  in  the  legisla 
ture  seemed  a  natural  one.  But  his  popularity, 
although  great  in  New  Salem,  had  not  spread 
far  enough  over  the  district,  and  he  was  defeated. 
Then  the  wretched  hand-to-mouth  struggle  began 

OD  O 

again.  He  "set  up  in  store  business"  with  a  dis 
solute  partner,  who  drank  whiskey  while  Lincoln 
was  reading  books.  The  result  was  a  disastrous 
failure  and  a  load  of  debt.  Thereupon  he  became 
a  deputy  surveyor,  and  was  appointed  postmaster 
of  New  Salem,  the  business  of  the  post-office  being 
so  small  that  he  could  carry  the  incoming  and 
outgoing  mail  in  his  hat.  All  this  could  not  lift 
him  from  poverty,  and  his  surveying  instruments 
and  horse  and  saddle  were  sold  by  the  sheriff  for 
debt. 

But  while  all  this  misery  was  upon  him,  his 
ambition  rose  to  higher  aims.  He  walked  many 


54  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

miles  to  borrow  from  a  schoolmaster  a  grammar 
with  which  to  improve  his  language.  A  lawyer 
lent  him  a  copy  of  Blackstone,  and  he  began  to 
study  law.  People  would  look  wonderingly  at  the 
grotesque  figure  lying  in  the  grass,  "with  his  feet 
up  a  tree,"  or  sitting  on  a  fence,  as,  absorbed  in 
a  book,  he  learned  to  construct  correct  sentences 
and  made  himself  a  jurist.  At  once  he  gained  a 
little  practice,  pettifogging  before  a  justice  of  the 
peace  for  friends,  without  expecting  a  fee.  Judi 
cial  functions,  too,  were  thrust  upon  him,  but  only 
at  horse-races  or  wrestling  matches,  where  his  ac 
knowledged  honesty  and  fairness  gave  his  verdicts 
undisputed  authority.  His  popularity  grew  apace, 
and  soon  he  could  be  a  candidate  for  the  legisla 
ture  again.  Although  he  called  himself  a  Whig, 
an  ardent  admirer  of  Henry  Clay,  his  clever  stump 
speeches  won  him  the  election  in  the  strongly 
Democratic  district.  Then  for  the  first  time,  per 
haps,  he  thought  seriously  of  his  outward  ap 
pearance.  So  far  he  had  been  content  with  a  garb 
of  "Kentucky  jeans,"  not  seldom  ragged,  usually 
patched,  and  always  shabby.  Now  he  borrowed 
some  money  from  a  friend  to  buy  a  new  suit  of 
clothes  —  "store  clothes"  —  fit  for  a  Sangamon 
County  statesman;  and  thus  adorned  he  set  out 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  55 

for  the  state  capital,  Vandalia,  to  take  his  seat  among 
the  lawmakers. 

His  legislative  career,  which  stretched  over  sev 
eral  sessions,  for  he  was  thrice  reflected,  in  1836, 
1838,  and  1 840,  was  not  remarkably  brilliant.  He 
did,  indeed,  not  lack  ambition.  He  dreamed  even 
of  making  himself  "the  De  Witt  Clinton  of  Illi 
nois,"  and  he  actually  distinguished  himself  by  zeal 
ous  and  effective  work  in  those  "log-rolling"  opera 
tions  by  which  the  young  State  received  "a  general 
system  of  internal  improvements  "  in  the  shape  of 
railroads,  canals,  and  banks,  —  a  reckless  policy, 
burdening  the  State  with  debt,  and  producing  the 
usual  crop  of  political  demoralization,  but  a  policy 
characteristic  of  the  time  and  the  impatiently  en 
terprising  spirit  of  the  Western  people.  Lincoln, 
no  doubt  with  the  best  intentions,  but  with  little 
knowledge  of  the  subject,  simply  followed  the  pop 
ular  current.  The  achievement  in  which,  perhaps, 
he  gloried  most  was  the  removal  of  the  state  gov 
ernment  from  Vandalia  to  Springfield, —  one  of 
those  triumphs  of  political  management  which  are 
apt  to  be  the  pride  of  the  small  politician's  states 
manship.  One  thing,  however,  he  did  in  which  his 
true  nature  asserted  itself,  and  which  gave  distinct 
promise  of  the  future  pursuit  of  high  aims.  Against 


56  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

an  overwhelming  preponderance  of  sentiment  in 
the  legislature,  followed  by  only  one  other  mem 
ber,  he  recorded  his  protest  against  a  proslavery 
resolution,  —  that  protest  declaring  « the  institu 
tion  of  slavery  to  be  founded  on  both  injustice 
and  bad  policy."  This  was  not  only  the  irrepres 
sible  voice  of  his  conscience ;  it  was  true  moral 
valor,  too ;  for  at  that  time,  in  many  parts  of  the 
West,  an  abolitionist  was  regarded  as  little  better 
than  a  horse- thief,  and  even  "Abe  Lincoln"  would 
hardly  have  been  forgiven  his  anti-slavery  principles 
had  he  not  been  known  as  such  an  "uncommon 
good  fellow."  But  here,  in  obedience  to  the  great 
conviction  of  his  life,  he  manifested  his  courage 
to  stand  alone,  —  that  courage  which  is  the  first 
requisite  of  leadership  in  a  great  cause. 

Together  with  his  reputation  and  influence  as  a 
politician  grew  his  law  practice,  especially  after  he 
had  removed  from  New  Salem  to  Springfield,  and 
associated  himself  with  a  practitioner  of  good  stand 
ing.  He  had  now  at  last  won  a  fixed  position  in  so 
ciety.  He  became  a  successful  lawyer,  less,  indeed, 
by  his  learning  as  a  jurist  than  by  his  effectiveness 
as  an  advocate  and  by  the  striking  uprightness  of 
his  character;  and  it  may  truly  be  said  that  his  vivid 
sense  of  truth  and  justice  had  much  to  do  with  his 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  57 

effectiveness  as  an  advocate.  He  would  refuse  to 
act  as  the  attorney  even  of  personal  friends  when  he 
saw  the  right  on  the  other  side.  He  would  abandon 
cases,  even  during  trial,  when  the  testimony  con 
vinced  him  that  his  client  was  in  the  wrong.  He 
would  dissuade  those  who  sought  his  service  from 
pursuing  an  obtainable  advantage  when  their  claims 
seemed  to  him  unfair.  Presenting  his  very  first  case 
in  the  United  States  Circuit  Court,  the  only  ques 
tion  being  one  of  authority,  he  declared  that,  upon 
careful  examination,  he  found  all  the  authorities  on 
the  other  side,  and  none  on  his.  Persons  accused 
of  crime,  when  he  thought  them  guilty,  he  would 
not  defend  at  all,  or,  attempting  their  defense, 
he  was  unable  to  put  forth  his  powers.  One  nota 
ble  exception  is  on  record,  when  his  personal  sym 
pathies  had  been  strongly  aroused.  But  when  he 
felt  himself  to  be  the  protector  of  innocence,  the 
defender  of  justice,  or  the  prosecutor  of  wrong, 
he  frequently  disclosed  such  unexpected  resources 
of  reasoning,  such  depth  of  feeling,  and  rose  to 
such  fervor  of  appeal  as  to  astonish  and  overwhelm 
his  hearers  and  make  him  fairly  irresistible.  Even 
an  ordinary  law  argument,  coming  from  him,  sel 
dom  failed  to  produce  the  impression  that  he  was 
profoundly  convinced  of  the  soundness  of  his  posi- 


58  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

tion.  It  is  not  surprising  that  the  mere  appearance 
of  so  conscientious  an  attorney  in  any  case  should 
have  carried,  not  only  to  juries,  but  even  to  judges, 
almost  a  presumption  of  right  on  his  side,  and  that 
the  people  began  to  call  him,  sincerely  meaning  it, 
"honest  Abe  Lincoln." 

In  the  mean  time  he  had  private  sorrows  and 
trials  of  a  painfully  afflicting  nature.  He  had  loved 
and  been  loved  by  a  fair  and  estimable  girl,  Ann 
Rutledge,  who  died  in  the  flower  of  her  youth 
and  beauty,  and  he  mourned  her  loss  with  such 
intensity  of  grief  that  his  friends  feared  for  his 
reason.  Recovering  from  his  morbid  depression, 
he  bestowed  what  he  thought  a  new  affection  upon 
another  lady,  who  refused  him.  And  finally,  mod 
erately  prosperous  in  his  worldly  affairs,  and  hav 
ing  prospects  of  political  distinction  before  him, 
he  paid  his  addresses  to  Mary  Todd,  of  Kentucky, 
and  was  accepted.  But  then  tormenting  doubts 
of  the  genuineness  of  his  own  affection  for  her,  of 
the  compatibility  of  their  characters,  and  of  their 
future  happiness  came  upon  him.  His  distress  was 
so  great  that  he  felt  himself  in  danger  of  suicide, 
and  feared  to  carry  a  pocket-knife  with  him ;  and 
he  gave  mortal  offense  to  his  bride  by  not  appearing 
on  the  appointed  wedding  day.  Now  the  tortur- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  59 

ing  consciousness  of  the  wrong  he  had  done  her 
grew  unendurable.  He  won  back  her  affection, 
ended  the  agony  by  marrying  her,  and  became  a 
faithful  and  patient  husband  and  a  good  father. 
But  it  was  no  secret,  to  those  who  knew  the  family 
well,  that  his  domestic  life  was  full  of  trials.  The 
erratic  temper  of  his  wife  not  seldom  put  the  gen 
tleness  of  his  nature  to  the  severest  tests;  and  these 
troubles  and  struggles,  which  accompanied  him 
through  all  the  vicissitudes  of  his  life  from  the 
modest  home  in  Springfield  to  the  White  House  at 
Washington,  adding  untold  private  heartburnings 
to  his  public  cares,  and  sometimes  precipitating 
upon  him  incredible  embarrassments  in  the  dis 
charge  of  his  public  duties,  form  one  of  the  most 
pathetic  features  of  his  career. 

He  continued  to  "  ride  the  circuit,"  read  books 
while  traveling  in  his  buggy,  told  funny  stories  to 
his  fellow  lawyers  in  the  tavern,  chatted  familiarly 
with  his  neighbors  around  the  stove  in  the  store 
and  at  the  post-office,  had  his  hours  of  melancholy 
brooding  as  of  old,  and  became  more  and  more 
widely  known  and  trusted  and  beloved  among  the 
people  of  his  State  for  his  ability  as  a  lawyer  and 
politician,  for  the  uprightness  of  his  character,  and 
the  ever-flowing  spring  of  sympathetic  kindness  in 


60  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

his  heart.  His  main  ambition  was  confessedly  that 
of  political  distinction ;  but  hardly  any  one  would 
at  that  time  have  seen  in  him  the  man  destined  to 
lead  the  nation  through  the  greatest  crisis  of  the 
century. 

His  time  had  not  yet  come  when,  in  1846,  he 
was  elected  to  Congress.  In  a  clever  speech  in  the 
House  of  Representatives,  he  denounced  President 
Polk  for  having  unjustly  forced  war  upon  Mexico, 
and  he  amused  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  by 
a  witty  attack  upon  General  Cass.  More  impor 
tant  was  the  expression  he  gave  to  his  anti-slavery 
impulses  by  offering  a  bill  looking  to  the  emanci 
pation  of  the  slaves  in  the  District  of  Columbia, 
and  by  his  repeated  votes  for  the  famous  Wilmot 
Proviso,  intended  to  exclude  slavery  from  the  Ter 
ritories  acquired  from  Mexico.  But  when,  at  the 
expiration  of  his  term,  in  March,  1849,  ne  ^eft  n^s 
seat,  he  gloomily  despaired  of  ever  seeing  the  day 
when  the  cause  nearest  to  his  heart  would  be  rightly 
grasped  by  the  people,  and  when  he  would  be  able 
to  render  any  service  to  his  country  in  solving  the 
great  problem.  Nor  had  his  career  as  a  member  of 
Congress  in  any  sense  been  such  as  to  gratify  his  am 
bition.  Indeed,  if  he  ever  had  any  belief  in  a  great 
destiny  for  himself,  it  must  have  been  weak  at  that 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  61 

period ;  for  he  actually  sought  to  obtain  from  the 
new  Whig  President,  General  Taylor,  the  place  of 
Commissioner  of  the  General  Land  Office,  willing 
to  bury  himself  in  one  of  the  administrative  bureaus 
of  the  government.  Fortunately  for  the  country, 
he  failed;  and  no  less  fortunately,  when,  later,  the 
territorial  governorship  of  Oregon  was  offered  to 
him,  Mrs.  Lincoln's  protest  induced  him  to  decline 
it.  Returning  to  Springfield,  he  gave  himself  with 
renewed  zest  to  his  law  practice,  acquiesced  in  the 
Compromise  of  1850  with  reluctance  and  a  men 
tal  reservation,  supported  in  the  presidential  cam 
paign  of  1852  the  Whig  candidate  in  some  spir 
itless  speeches,  and  took  but  a  languid  interest  in 
the  politics  of  the  day.  But  just  then  his  time  was 
drawing  near. 

The  peace  promised,  and  apparently  inaugu 
rated,  by  the  Compromise  of  1850  was  rudely 
broken  by  the  introduction  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
bill  in  1854.  The  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Com 
promise,  opening  the  Territories  of  the  United 
States,  the  heritage  of  coming  generations,  to  the 
invasion  of  slavery,  suddenly  revealed  the  whole 
significance  of  the  slavery  question  to  the  people 
of  the  free  States,  and  thrust  itself  into  the  poli 
tics  of  the  country  as  the  paramount  issue.  Some- 


62  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

thing  like  an  electric  shock  flashed  through  the 
North.  Men  who  but  a  short  time  before  had 
been  absorbed  by  their  business  pursuits,  and  dep 
recated  all  political  agitation,  were  startled  out  of 
their  security  by  a  sudden  alarm,  and  excitedly 
took  sides.  That  restless  trouble  of  conscience 
about  slavery,  which  even  in  times  of  apparent 
repose  had  secretly  disturbed  the  souls  of  North 
ern  people,  broke  forth  in  an  utterance  louder  than 
ever.  The  bonds  of  accustomed  party  allegiance 
gave  way.  Anti-slavery  Democrats  and  anti-slavery 
Whigs  felt  themselves  drawn  together  by  a  common 
overpowering  sentiment,  and  soon  they  began  to 
rally  in  a  new  organization.  The  Republican  party 
sprang  into  being  to  meet  the  overruling  call  of 
the  hour.  Then  Abraham  Lincoln's  time  was  come. 
He  rapidly  advanced  to  a  position  of  conspicu 
ous  championship  in  the  struggle.  This,  however, 
was  not  owing  to  his  virtues  and  abilities  alone. 
Indeed,  the  slavery  question  stirred  his  soul  in  its 
profoundest  depths ;  it  was,  as  one  of  his  intimate 
friends  said,  "  the  only  one  on  which  he  would  be 
come  excited ;  "  it  called  forth  all  his  faculties  and 
energies.  Yet  there  were  many  others  who,  having 
long  and  arduously  fought  the  anti-slavery  battle 
in  the  popular  assembly,  or  in  the  press,  or  in  the 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  63 

halls  of  Congress,  far  surpassed  him  in  prestige, 
and  compared  with  whom  he  was  still  an  obscure 
and  untried  man.  His  reputation,  although  highly 
honorable  and  well  earned,  had  so  far  been  essen 
tially  local.  As  a  stump-speaker  in  Whig  canvasses 
outside  of  his  State,  he  had  attracted  compara 
tively  little  attention ;  but  in  Illinois  he  had  been 
recognized  as  one  of  the  foremost  men  of  the  Whig 
party.  Among  the  opponents  of  the  Nebraska 
bill  he  occupied  in  his  State  so  important  a  posi 
tion  that  in  1854  he  was  the  choice  of  a  large 
majority  of  the  "Anti-Nebraska  men"  in  the  legis 
lature  for  a  seat  in  the  Senate  of  the  United  States 
which  then  became  vacant;  and  when  he,  an  old 
Whig,  could  not  obtain  the  votes  of  the  Anti- 
Nebraska  Democrats  necessary  to  make  a  majority, 
he  generously  urged  his  friends  to  transfer  their 
votes  to  Lyman  Trumbull,  who  was  then  elected. 
Two  years  later,  in  the  first  national  convention  of 
the  Republican  party,  the  delegation  from  Illinois 
brought  him  forward  as  a  candidate  for  the  vice- 
presidency,  and  he  received  respectable  support. 
Still,  the  name  of  Abraham  Lincoln  was  not  widely 
known  beyond  the  boundaries  of  his  own  State. 
But  now  it  was  this  local  prominence  in  Illinois 
that  put  him  in  a  position  of  peculiar  advantage 


64  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

on  the  battlefield  of  national  politics.  In  the 
assault  on  the  Missouri  Compromise  which  broke 
down  all  legal  barriers  to  the  spread  of  slavery, 
Stephen  Arnold  Douglas  was  the  ostensible  leader 
and  central  figure;  and  Douglas  was  a  senator  from 
Illinois,  Lincoln's  State.  Douglas's  national  theatre 
of  action  was  the  Senate,  but  in  his  constituency  in 
Illinois  were  the  roots  of  his  official  position  and 
power.  What  he  did  in  the  Senate  he  had  to  justify 
before  the  people  of  Illinois,  in  order  to  maintain 
himself  in  place  ;  and  in  Illinois  all  eyes  turned  to 
Lincoln  as  Douglas's  natural  antagonist. 

As  very  young  men  they  had  come  to  Illinois, 
Lincoln  from  Indiana,  Douglas  from  Vermont,  and 
had  grown  up  together  in  public  life,  Douglas  as  a 
Democrat,  Lincoln  as  a  Whig.  They  had  met  first 
in  Vandalia,  in  1834,  when  Lincoln  was  in  the 
legislature  and  Douglas  in  the  lobby;  and  again  in 
1836,  both  as  members  of  the  legislature.  Douglas, 
a  very  able  politician,  of  the  agile,  combative,  auda 
cious,  "pushing"  sort,  rose  in  political  distinction 
with  remarkable  rapidity.  In  quick  succession  he 
became  a  member  of  the  legislature,  a  State's  attor 
ney,  Secretary  of  State,  a  judge  on  the  supreme 
bench  of  Illinois,  three  times  a  representative  in 
Congress,  and  a  senator  of  the  United  States  when 


I /•/•>! /f<r ///  __'//•/  ff>//t    s  //   /(V/X 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  65 

only  thirty-nine  years  old.  In  the  national  Demo 
cratic  convention  of  1852,  he  appeared  even  as 
an  aspirant  to  the  nomination  for  the  presidency, 
as  the  favorite  of  "young  America,"  and  received 
a  respectable  vote.  He  had  far  outstripped  Lin 
coln  in  what  is  commonly  called  political  success 
and  in  reputation.  But  it  had  frequently  happened 
that  in  political  campaigns  Lincoln  felt  himself 
impelled,  or  was  selected  by  his  Whig  friends,  to 
answer  Douglas's  speeches;  and  thus  the  two  were 
looked  upon,  in  a  large  part  of  the  State  at  least, 
as  the  representative  combatants  of  their  respec 
tive  parties  in  the  debates  before  popular  meetings. 
As  soon,  therefore,  as,  after  the  passage  of  his  Kan 
sas-Nebraska  bill,  Douglas  returned  to  Illinois  to 
defend  his  cause  before  his  constituents,  Lincoln, 
obeying  not  only  his  own  impulse,  but  also  gen 
eral  expectation,  stepped  forward  as  his  principal 
opponent.  Thus  the  struggle  about  the  princi 
ples  involved  in  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill,  or,  in  a 
broader  sense,  the  struggle  between  freedom  and 
slavery,  assumed  in  Illinois  the  outward  form  of 
a  personal  contest  between  Lincoln  and  Douglas; 
and  as  it  continued  and  became  more  animated, 
that  personal  contest  in  Illinois  was  watched  with 
constantly  increasing  interest  by  the  whole  coun- 


66  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

try.  When,  in  1858,  Douglas's  senatorial  term 
being  about  to  expire,  Lincoln  was  formally  desig 
nated  by  the  Republican  convention  of  Illinois  as 
their  candidate  for  the  Senate,  to  take  Douglas's 
place,  and  the  two  contestants  agreed  to  debate 
the  questions  at  issue  face  to  face  in  a  series  of 
public  meetings,  the  eyes  of  the  whole  American 
people  were  turned  eagerly  to  that  one  point;  and 
the  spectacle  reminded  one  of  those  lays  of  ancient 
times  telling  of  two  armies,  in  battle  array,  stand 
ing  still  to  see  their  two  principal  champions  fight 
out  the  contested  cause  between  the  lines  in  single 
combat. 

Lincoln  had  then  reached  the  full  maturity  of 
his  powers.  His  equipment  as  a  statesman  did  not 
embrace  a  comprehensive  knowledge  of  public 
affairs.  What  he  had  studied  he  had  indeed  made 
his  own,  with  the  eager  craving  and  that  zealous 
tenacity  characteristic  of  superior  minds  learning 
under  difficulties.  But  his  narrow  opportunities 
and  the  unsteady  life  he  had  led  during  his  younger 
years  had  not  permitted  the  accumulation  of  large 
stores  in  his  mind.  It  is  true,  in  political  campaigns 
he  had  occasionally  spoken  on  the  ostensible  issues 
between  the  Whigs  and  the  Democrats,  the  tariff, 
internal  improvements,  banks,  and  so  on,  but  only 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  67 

in  a  perfunctory  manner.  Had  he  ever  given  much 
serious  thought  and  study  to  these  subjects,  it  is 
safe  to  assume  that  a  mind  so  prolific  of  original 
conceits  as  his  would  certainly  have  produced  some 
utterance  upon  them  worth  remembering.  His 
soul  had  evidently  never  been  deeply  stirred  by  such 
topics.  But  when  his  moral  nature  was  aroused, 
his  brain  developed  an  untiring  activity  until  it  had 
mastered  all  the  knowledge  within  reach.  As  soon 
as  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  had  thrust 
the  slavery  question  into  politics  as  the  paramount 
issue,  Lincoln  plunged  into  an  arduous  study  of  all 
its  legal,  historical,  and  moral  aspects,  and  then  his 
mind  became  a  complete  arsenal  of  argument.  His 
rich  natural  gifts,  trained  by  long  and  varied  prac 
tice,  had  made  him  an  orator  of  rare  persuasiveness. 
In  his  immature  days,  he  had  pleased  himself  for 
a  short  period  with  that  inflated,  high-flown  style 
which,  among  the  uncultivated,  passes  for  "  beau 
tiful  speaking."  His  inborn  truthfulness  and  his 
artistic  instinct  soon  overcame  that  aberration,  and 
revealed  to  him  the  noble  beauty  and  strength  of 
simplicity.  He  possessed  an  uncommon  power  of 
clear  and  compact  statement,  which  might  have  re 
minded  those  who  knew  the  story  of  his  early  youth 
of  the  efforts  of  the  poor  boy,  when  he  copied  his 


68  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

compositions  from  the  scraped  wooden  shovel,  care 
fully  to  trim  his  expressions  in  order  to  save  paper. 
His  language  had  the  energy  of  honest  directness, 
and  he  was  a  master  of  logical  lucidity.  He  loved 
to  point  and  enliven  his  reasoning  by  humorous 
illustrations,  usually  anecdotes  of  Western  life,  of 
which  he  had  an  inexhaustible  store  at  his  com 
mand.  These  anecdotes  had  not  seldom  a  flavor 
of  rustic  robustness  about  them,  but  he  used  them 
with  great  effect,  while  amusing  the  audience,  to 
give  life  to  an  abstraction,  to  explode  an  absurdity, 
to  clinch  an  argument,  to  drive  home  an  admoni 
tion.  The  natural  kindliness  of  his  tone,  softening 
prejudice  and  disarming  partisan  rancor,  would 
often  open  to  his  reasoning  a  way  into  minds  most 
unwilling  to  receive  it. 

Yet  his  greatest  power  consisted  in  the  charm  of 
his  individuality.  That  charm  did  not,  in  the  ordi 
nary  way,  appeal  to  the  ear  or  to  the  eye.  His  voice' 
was  not  melodious;  rather  shrill  and  piercing,  espe 
cially  when  it  rose  to  its  high  treble  in  moments  of 
great  animation.  His  figure  was  unhandsome,  and 
the  action  of  his  unwieldy  limbs  awkward.  He  com 
manded  none  of  the  outward  graces  of  oratory  as 
they  are  commonly  understood.  His  charm  was  of 
a  different  kind.  It  flowed  from  the  rare  depth  and 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  69 

genuineness  of  his  convictions  and  his  sympathetic 
feelings.  Sympathy  was  the  strongest  element  in 
his  nature.  One  of  his  biographers,  who  knew  him 
before  he  became  President,  says:  "Lincoln's  com 
passion  might  be  stirred  deeply  by  an  object  present, 
but  never  by  an  object  absent  and  unseen.  In  the 
former  case  he  would  most  likely  extend  relief,  with 
little  inquiry  into  the  merits  of  the  case,  because, 
as  he  expressed  it  himself,  it  <took  a  pain  out  of  his 
own  heart/  '  Only  half  of  this  is  correct.  It  is  cer 
tainly  true  that  he  could  not  witness  any  individ 
ual  distress  or  oppression,  or  any  kind  of  suffering, 
without  feeling  a  pang  of  pain  himself,  and  that  by 
relieving  as  much  as  he  could  the  suffering  of  oth 
ers  he  put  an  end  to  his  own.  This  compassionate 
impulse  to  help  he  felt  not  only  for  human  beings, 
but  for  every  living  creature.  As  in  his  boyhood  he 
angrily  reproved  the  boys  who  tormented  a  wood 
turtle  by  putting  a  burning  coal  on  its  back,  so,  we 
are  told,  he  would,  when  a  mature  man,  on  a  jour 
ney,  dismount  from  his  buggy  and  wade  waist-deep 
in  mire  to  rescue  a  pig  struggling  in  a  swamp.  In 
deed,  appeals  to  his  compassion  were  so  irresistible 
to  him,  and  he  felt  it  so  difficult  to  refuse  anything 
when  his  refusal  could  give  pain,  that  he  himself 
sometimes  spoke  of  his  inability  to  say  "no"  as 


7o  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

a  positive  weakness.  But  that  certainly  does  not 
prove  that  his  compassionate  feeling  was  confined 
to  individual  cases  of  suffering  witnessed  with  his 
own  eyes.  As  the  boy  was  moved  by  the  aspect 
of  the  tortured  wood  turtle  to  compose  an  essay 
against  cruelty  to  animals  in  general,  so  the  aspect 
of  other  cases  of  suffering  and  wrong  wrought  up 
his  moral  nature,  and  set  his  mind  to  work  against 
cruelty,  injustice,  and  oppression  in  general. 

As  his  sympathy  went  forth  to  others,  it  attracted 
others  to  him.  Especially  those  whom  he  called  the 
"plain  people"  felt  themselves  drawn  to  him  by 
the  instinctive  feeling  that  he  understood,  esteemed, 
and  appreciated  them.  He  had  grown  up  among 
the  poor,  the  lowly,  the  ignorant.  He  never  ceased 
to  remember  the  good  souls  he  had  met  among 
them,  and  the  many  kindnesses  they  had  done  him. 
Although  in  his  mental  development  he  had  risen 
far  above  them,  he  never  looked  down  upon  them. 
How  they  felt  and  how  they  reasoned  he  knew,  for 
so  he  had  once  felt  and  reasoned  himself.  How 
they  could  be  moved  he  knew,  for  so  he  had  once 
been  moved  himself, and  he  practiced  moving  others. 
His  mind  was  much  larger  than  theirs,  but  it  thor 
oughly  comprehended  theirs;  and  while  he  thought 
much  farther  than  they,  their  thoughts  were  ever 


,  J 

X 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  71 

present  to  him.  Nor  had  the  visible  distance  be 
tween  them  grown  as  wide  as  his  rise  in  the  world 
would  seem  to  have  warranted.  Much  of  his  back 
woods  speech  and  manners  still  clung  to  him.  Al 
though  he  had  become  "Mr.  Lincoln"  to  his  later 
acquaintances,  he  was  still  "Abe"  to  the  "Nats" 
and  "Billys"  and  "Daves"  of  his  youth;  and  their 
familiarity  neither  appeared  unnatural  to  them, 
nor  was  it  in  the  least  awkward  to  him.  He  still 
told  and  enjoyed  stories  similar  to  those  he  had  told 
and  enjoyed  in  the  Indiana  settlement  and  at  New 
Salem.  His  wants  remained  as  modest  as  they  had 
ever  been;  his  domestic  habits  had  by  no  means 
completely  accommodated  themselves  to  those  of 
his  more  high-born  wife;  and  though  the  "Ken 
tucky  jeans"  apparel  had  long  been  dropped,  his 
clothes  of  better  material  and  better  make  would 
sit  ill  sorted  on  his  gigantic  limbs.  His  cotton 
umbrella,  without  a  handle,  and  tied  together 
with  a  coarse  string  to  keep  it  from  flapping,  when 
he  carried  on  his  circuit  rides,  is  said  to  be  remem 
bered  still  by  some  of  his  surviving  neighbors.  This 
rusticity  of  habit  was  utterly  free  from  that  affected 
contempt  of  refinement  and  comfort  which  self- 
made  men  sometimes  carry  into  their  more  afflu 
ent  circumstances.  To  Abraham  Lincoln  it  was 


72  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

entirely  natural,  and  all  those  who  came  into  con 
tact  with  him  knew  it  to  be  so.  In  his  ways  of 
thinking  and  feeling  he  had  become  a  gentleman 
in  the  highest  sense,  but  the  refining  process  had 
polished  but  little  the  outward  form.  The  plain 
people,  therefore, still  considered  "honest  Abe  Lin 
coln"  one  of  themselves:  and  when  they  felt,  which 
they  no  doubt  frequently  did,  that  his  thoughts 
and  aspirations  moved  in  a  sphere  above  their  own, 
they  were  all  the  more  proud  of  him,  without  any 
diminution  of  fellow  feeling.  It  was  this  relation 
of  mutual  sympathy  and  understanding  between 
Lincoln  and  the  plain  people  that  gave  him  his 
peculiar  power  as  a  public  man,  and  singularly  fit 
ted  him,  as  we  shall  see,  for  that  leadership  which 
was  preeminently  required  in  the  great  crisis  then 
coming  on, —  the  leadership  which  indeed  thinks 
and  moves  ahead  of  the  masses,  but  always  remains 
within  sight  and  sympathetic  touch  of  them. 

He  entered  upon  the  campaign  of  1858  better 
equipped  than  he  had  ever  been  before.  He  not 
only  instinctively  felt,  but  he  had  convinced  him 
self  by  arduous  study,  that  in  this  struggle  against 
the  spread  of  slavery  he  had  right,  justice,  philo 
sophy,  the  enlightened  opinion  of  mankind,  his 
tory,  the  Constitution,  and  good  policy  on  his  side. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  73 

It  was  observed  that  after  he  began  to  discuss  the 
slavery  question  his  speeches  were  pitched  in  a 
much  loftier  key  than  his  former  oratorical  efforts. 
While  he  remained  fond  of  telling  funny  stories  in 
private  conversation,  they  disappeared  more  and 
more  from  his  public  discourse.  He  would  still  now 
.  and  then  point  his  argument  with  expressions  of 
inimitable  quaintness,  and  flash  out  rays  of  kindly 
humor  and  witty  irony;  but  his  general  tone  was 
serious,  and  rose  sometimes  to  genuine  solemnity. 
His  masterly  skill  in  dialectical  thrust  and  parry, 
his  wealth  of  knowledge,  his  power  of  reasoning, 
and  elevation  of  sentiment,  disclosed  in  language 
of  rare  precision,  strength,  and  beauty,  not  seldom 
astonished  his  old  friends. 

Neither  of  the  two  champions  could  have  found 
a  more  formidable  antagonist  than  each  now  met  in 
the  other.  Douglas  was  by  far  the  most  conspicu 
ous  member  of  his  party.  His  admirers  had  dubbed 
him  "the  little  giant,"  contrasting  in  that  nick 
name  the  greatness  of  his  mind  with  the  smallness 
of  his  body.  But  though  of  low  stature,  his  broad- 
shouldered  figure  appeared  uncommonly  sturdy, 
and  there  was  something  lion-like  in  the  square 
ness  of  his  brow  and  jaw,  and  in  the  defiant  shake 
of  his  long  hair.  His  loud  and  persistent  advocacy 


74  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

of  territorial  expansion,  in  the  name  of  patriotism 
and  "manifest  destiny,"  had  given  him  an  enthu 
siastic  following  among  the  young  and  ardent. 
Great  natural  parts,  a  highly  combative  tempera 
ment,  and  long  training  had  made  him  a  debater 
unsurpassed  in  a  Senate  filled  with  able  men.  He 
could  be  as  forceful  in  his  appeals  to  patriotic 
feelings  as  he  was  fierce  in  denunciation  and  thor 
oughly  skilled  in  all  the  baser  tricks  of  parliamen 
tary  pugilism.  While  genial  and  rollicking  in  his 
social  intercourse, — the  idol  of  the  "boys," — he 
felt  himself  one  of  the  most  renowned  statesmen 
of  his  time,  and  would  frequently  meet  his  oppo 
nents  with  an  overbearing  haughtiness,  as  persons 
more  to  be  pitied  than  to  be  feared.  In  his  speech 
opening  the  campaign  of  1858,  he  spoke  of  Lin 
coln,  whom  the  Republicans  had  dared  to  advance 
as  their  candidate  for  "  his "  place  in  the  Senate, 
with  an  air  of  patronizing  if  not  contemptuous  con 
descension,  as  "a  kind,  amiable,  and  intelligent 
gentleman  and  a  good  citizen."  The  little  giant 
would  have  been  pleased  to  pass  off  his  antagonist 
as  a  tall  dwarf.  He  knew  Lincoln  too  well,  how 
ever,  to  indulge  himself  seriously  in  such  a  delusion. 
But  the  political  situation  was  at  that  moment 
in  a  curious  tangle,  and  Douglas  could  expect  to 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  75 

derive  from  the  confusion  great  advantage  over  his 
opponent. 

By  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise,  open 
ing  the  Territories  to  the  ingress  of  slavery,  Doug 
las  had  pleased  the  South,  but  greatly  alarmed  the 
North.  He  had  sought  to  conciliate  Northern  sen 
timent  by  appending  to  his  Kansas-Nebraska  bill 
the  declaration  that  its  intent  was  "  not  to  legislate 
slavery  into  any  State  or  Territory,  nor  to  exclude 
it  therefrom,  but  to  leave  the  people  thereof  per 
fectly  free  to  form  and  regulate  their  institutions 
in  their  own  way,  subject  only  to  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States."  This  he  called  "  the  great 
principle  of  popular  sovereignty."  When  asked 
whether,  under  this  act,  the  people  of  a  Territory, 
before  its  admission  as  a  State,  would  have  the  right 
to  exclude  slavery,  he  answered,  "  That  is  a  ques 
tion  for  the  courts  to  decide."  Then  came  the  fa 
mous  "Dred  Scott  decision,"  in  which  the  Supreme 
Court  held  substantially  that  the  right  to  hold  slaves 
as  property  existed  in  the  Territories  by  virtue  of 
the  Federal  Constitution,  and  that  this  right  could 
not  be  denied  by  any  act  of  a  territorial  govern 
ment.  This,  of  course,  denied  the  right  of  the  peo 
ple  of  any  Territory  to  exclude  slavery  while  they 
were  in  a  territorial  condition,  and  it  alarmed  the 


76  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

Northern  people  still  more.  Douglas  recognized 
the  binding  force  of  the  decision  of  the  Supreme 
Court,  at  the  same  time  maintaining,  most  illogi- 
cally,  that  his  great  principle  of  popular  sover 
eignty  remained  in  force  nevertheless.  Meanwhile, 
the  pro-slavery  people  of  western  Missouri,  the  so- 
called  "border  ruffians,"  had  invaded  Kansas,  set 
up  a  constitutional  convention,  made  a  constitu 
tion  of  an  extreme  pro-slavery  type,  the  "Lecomp- 
ton  Constitution,"  refused  to  submit  it  fairly  to 
a  vote  of  the  people  of  Kansas,  and  then  referred 
it  to  Congress  for  acceptance,  —  seeking  thus  to 
accomplish  the  admission  of  Kansas  as  a  slave  State. 
Had  Douglas  supported  such  a  scheme,  he  would 
have  lost  all  foothold  in  the  North.  In  the  name 
of  popular  sovereignty  he  loudly  declared  his  op 
position  to  the  acceptance  of  any  constitution  not 
sanctioned  by  a  formal  popular  vote.  He  "did 
not  care,"  he  said,  "whether  slavery  be  voted  up  or 
down,"  but  there  must  be  a  fair  vote  of  the  people. 
Thus  he  drew  upon  himself  the  hostility  of  the 
Buchanan  administration,  which  was  controlled  by 
the  pro-slavery  interest,  but  he  saved  his  Northern 
following.  More  than  this,  not  only  did  his  Demo 
cratic  admirers  now  call  him  "  the  true  champion 
of  freedom,"  but  even  some  Republicans  of  large 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  77 

influence,  prominent  among  them  Horace  Greeley, 
sympathizing  with  Douglas  in  his  fight  against  the 
Lecompton  Constitution,and  hoping  to  detach  him 
permanently  from  the  pro-slavery  interest  and  to 
force  a  lasting  breach  in  the  Democratic  party,  seri 
ously  advised  the  Republicans  of  Illinois  to  give  up 
their  opposition  to  Douglas,  and  to  help  reelecthim 
to  the  Senate.  Lincoln  was  not  of  that  opinion. 
He  believed  that  great  popular  movements  can 
succeed  only  when  guided  by  their  faithful  friends, 
and  that  the  anti-slavery  cause  could  not  safely  be 
intrusted  to  the  keeping  of  one  who  "did  not  care 
whether  slavery  be  voted  up  ordown."  This  opinion 
prevailed  in  Illinois;  but  the  influences  within  the 
Republican  party,  over  which  it  prevailed,  yielded 
only  a  reluctant  acquiescence,  if  they  acquiesced  at 
all,  after  having  materially  strengthened  Douglas's 
position.  Such  was  the  situation  of  things  when 
the  campaign  of  1 8  5  8  between  Lincoln  and  Doug 
las  began. 

Lincoln  opened  the  campaign  on  his  side,  at  the 
convention  which  nominatedhim  as  the  Republican 
candidate  for  the  senatorship,  with  a  memorable 
saying  which  sounded  like  a  shout  from  the  watch- 
tower  of  history  :  "  A  house  divided  against  itself 
cannot  stand.  I  believe  this  government  cannot 


78  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

endure  permanently  half  slave  and  half  free.  I 
do  not  expect  the  Union  to  be  dissolved.  I  do  not 
expect  the  house  to  fall,  but  I  expect  it  will  cease  to 
be  divided.  It  will  become  all  one  thing  or  all  the 
other.  Either  the  opponents  of  slavery  will  arrest 
the  further  spread  of  it,  and  place  it  where  the  pub 
lic  mind  shall  rest  in  the  belief  that  it  is  in  the 
course  of  ultimate  extinction;  or  its  advocates  will 
push  it  forward,  till  it  shall  become  alike  lawful  in 
all  the  States,  —  old  as  well  as  new,  North  as  well 
as  South."  Then  he  proceeded  to  point  out  that 
the  Nebraska  doctrine  combined  with  the  Dred 
Scott  decision  worked  in  the  direction  of  making 
the  nation  "all  slave."  Here  was  the  "irrepressible 
conflict"  spoken  of  by  Seward  a  short  time  later, 
in  a  speech  made  famous  mainly  by  that  phrase. 
If  there  was  any  new  discovery  in  it,  the  right  of 
priority  was  Lincoln's.  This  utterance  proved  not 
only  his  statesmanlike  conception  of  the  issue,  but 
also,  in  his  situation  as  a  candidate,  the  firmness  of 
his  moral  courage.  The  friends  to  whom  he  had 
read  the  draught  of  this  speech  before  he  delivered 
it  warned  him  anxiously  that  its  delivery  might  be 
fatal  to  his  success  in  the  election.  This  was  shrewd 
advice,  in  the  ordinary  sense.  While  a  slaveholder 
could  threaten  disunion  with  impunity,  the  mere 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  79 

suggestion  that  the  existence  of  slavery  was  incom 
patible  with  freedom  in  the  Union  would  hazard 
the  political  chances  of  any  public  man  in  the  North. 
But  Lincoln  was  inflexible.  "It  is  true,"  said  he, 
"  and  I  will  deliver  it  as  written.  ...  I  would  rather 
be  defeated  with  these  expressions  in  my  speech 
held  up  and  discussed  before  the  people  than  be  vic 
torious  without  them."  The  statesman  was  right 
in  his  far-seeing  judgment  and  his  conscientious 
statement  of  the  truth,  but  the  practical  politicians 
were  also  right  in  their  prediction  of  the  immediate 
effect.  Douglas  instantly  seized  upon  the  declara 
tion  that  a  house  divided  against  itself  cannot  stand 
as  the  main  objective  point  of  his  attack,  interpret 
ing  it  as  an  incitement  to  a  "  relentless  sectional 
war,"  and  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  persistent  reit 
eration  of  this  charge  served  to  frighten  not  a  few 
timid  souls. 

Lincoln  constantly  endeavored  to  bring  the 
moral  and  philosophical  side  of  the  subject  to  the 
foreground.  "  Slavery  is  wrong"  was  the  keynote 
of  all  his  speeches.  To  Douglas's  glittering  sophism 
that  the  right  of  the  people  of  a  Territory  to  have 
slavery  or  not,  as  they  might  desire,  was  in  accord 
ance  with  the  principle  of  true  popular  sovereignty, 
he  made  the  pointed  answer:  "Then  true  popular 


8o  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

sovereignty,  according  to  Senator  Douglas,  means 
that,  when  one  man  makes  another  man  his  slave, 
no  third  man  shall  be  allowed  to  object."  To 
Douglas's  argument  that  the  principle  which  de 
manded  that  the  people  of  a  Territory  should  be 
permitted  to  choose  whether  they  would  have  slav 
ery  or  not  "originated  when  God  made  man,  and 
placed  good  and  evil  before  him,  allowing  him  to 
choose  upon  his  own  responsibility,"  Lincoln  sol 
emnly  replied :  "No;  God  did  not  place  good  and 
evil  before  man,  telling  him  to  make  his  choice. 
On  the  contrary,  God  did  tell  him  there  was  one 
tree  of  the  fruit  of  which  he  should  not  eat,  upon 
pain  of  death."  He  did  not,  however,  place  him 
self  on  the  most  advanced  ground  taken  by  the  rad 
ical  anti-slavery  men.  He  admitted  that,  under  the 
Constitution,  "the  Southern  people  were  entitled 
to  a  congressional  fugitive  slave  law,"  although  he 
did  not  approve  the  fugitive  slave  law  then  existing. 
He  declared  also  that,  if  slavery  were  kept  out  of 
the  Territories  during  their  territorial  existence,  as 
it  should  be,  and  if  then  the  people  of  any  Territory, 
having  a  fair  chance  and  a  clear  field,  should  do 
such  an  extraordinary  thing  as  to  adopt  a  slave  con 
stitution,  uninfluenced  by  the  actual  presence  of 
the  institution  among  them,  he  saw  no  alternative 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  81 

but  to  admit  such  a  Territory  into  the  Union.  He 
declared  further  that,  while  he  should  be  exceed 
ingly  glad  to  see  slavery  abolished  in  the  District 
of  Columbia,  he  would,  as  a  member  of  Congress, 
with  his  present  views,  not  endeavor  to  bring  on 
that  abolition  except  on  condition  that  emancipa 
tion  be  gradual,  that  it  be  approved  by  the  deci 
sion  of  a  majority  of  voters  in  the  District,  and  that 
compensation  be  made  to  unwilling  owners.  On 
every  available  occasion,  he  pronounced  himself  in 
favor  of  the  deportation  and  colonization  of  the 
blacks,  of  course  with  their  consent.  He  repeatedly 
disavowed  any  wish  on  his  part  to  have  social  and 
political  equality  established  between  whites  and 
blacks.  On  this  point  he  summed  up  his  views  in 
a  reply  to  Douglas's  assertion  that  the  Declaration 
of  Independence,  in  speaking  of  all  men  as  being 
created  equal,  did  not  include  the  negroes,  saying : 
"I  do  not  understand  the  Declaration  of  Independ 
ence  to  mean  that  all  men  were  created  equal  in 
all  respects.  They  are  not  equal  in  color.  But  I 
believe  that  it  does  mean  to  declare  that  all  men 
are  equal  in  some  respects;  they  are  equal  in  their 
right  to  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness." 
With  regard  to  some  of  these  subjects  Lincoln 
modified  his  position  at  a  later  period,  and  it  has 


82  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

been  suggested  that  he  would  have  professed  more 
advanced  principles  in  his  debates  with  Douglas, 
had  he  not  feared  thereby  to  lose  votes.  This  view 
can  hardly  be  sustained.  Lincoln  had  the  courage 
of  his  opinions,  but  he  was  not  a  radical.  The  man 
who  risked  his  election  by  delivering,  against  the 
urgent  protest  of  his  friends,  the  speech  about  "the 
house  divided  against  itself"  would  not  have  shrunk 
from  the  expression  of  more  extreme  views,  had  he 
really  entertained  them.  It  is  only  fair  to  assume 
that  he  said  what  at  the  time  he  really  thought, 
and  that  if,  subsequently,  his  opinions  changed,  it 
was  owing  to  new  conceptions  of  good  policy  and 
of  duty  brought  forth  by  an  entirely  new  set  of  cir 
cumstances  and  exigencies.  It  is  characteristic  that 
he  continued  to  adhere  to  the  impracticable  colo 
nization  plan  even  after  the  Emancipation  Procla 
mation  had  already  been  issued. 

But  in  this  contest  Lincoln  proved  himself  not 
only  a  debater,  but  also  a  political  strategist  of  the 
first  order.  The  "  kind,  amiable,  and  intelligent 
gentleman,"  as  Douglas  had  been  pleased  to  call 
him,  was  by  no  means  as  harmless  as  a  dove.  He  pos 
sessed  an  uncommon  share  of  that  worldly  shrewd 
ness  which  not  seldom  goes  with  genuine  simplicity 
of  character;  and  the  political  experience  gathered 


.  //'AV/vr/.    rf '  (  >/<  f/ff 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  83 

in  the  legislature  and  in  Congress  and  in  many 
election  campaigns,  added  to  his  keen  intuitions, 
had  made  him  as  far-sighted  a  judge  of  the  proba 
ble  effects  of  a  public  man's  sayings  or  doings  upon 
the  popular  mind,  and  as  accurate  a  calculator  in 
estimating  political  chances  and  forecasting  results, 
as  could  be  found  among  the  party  managers  in 
Illinois.  And  now  he  perceived  keenly  the  ugly 
dilemma  in  which  Douglas  found  himself,  between 
the  Dred  Scott  decision,  which  declared  the  right 
to  hold  slaves  to  exist  in  the  Territories  by  virtue 
of  the  Federal  Constitution,  and  his  "great  prin 
ciple  of  popular  sovereignty,"  according  to  which 
the  people  of  a  Territory,  if  they  saw  fit,  were  to 
have  the  right  to  exclude  slavery  therefrom.  Doug 
las  was  twisting  and  squirming  to  the  best  of  his 
ability  to  avoid  the  admission  that  the  two  were  in 
compatible.  The  question  then  presented  itself  if 
it  would  be  good  policy  for  Lincoln  to  force  Doug 
las  to  a  clear  expression  of  his  opinion  as  to  whether, 
the  Dred  Scott  decision  notwithstanding,  "the  peo 
ple  of  a  Territory  could  in  any  lawful  way  exclude 
slavery  from  its  limits  prior  to  the  formation  of  a 
state  constitution."  Lincoln  foresaw  and  predicted 
what  Douglas  would  answer:  that  slavery  could  not 
exist  in  a  Territory  unless  the  people  desired  it 


84  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

and  gave  it  protection  by  territorial  legislation.  In 
an  improvised  caucus  the  policy  of  pressing  the 
interrogatory  on  Douglas  was  discussed.  Lincoln's 
friends  unanimously  advised  against  it,  because  the 
answer  foreseen  would  sufficiently  commend  Doug 
las  to  the  people  of  Illinois  to  insure  his  reelection 
to  the  Senate.  But  Lincoln  persisted.  "I  am  after 
larger  game,"  said  he.  "  If  Douglas  so  answers,  he 
can  never  be  President,  and  the  battle  of  1860  is 
worth  a  hundred  of  this."  The  interrogatory  was 
pressed  upon  Douglas,  and  Douglas  did  answer  that, 
no  matter  what  the  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court 
might  be  on  the  abstract  question,  the  people  of 
a  Territory  had  the  lawful  means  to  introduce  or 
exclude  slavery  by  territorial  legislation  friendly  or 
unfriendly  to  the  institution.  Lincoln  found  it  easy 
to  show  the  absurdity  of  the  proposition  that,  if 
slavery  were  admitted  to  exist  of  right  in  the  Ter 
ritories  by  virtue  of  the  supreme  law,  the  Federal 
Constitution,  it  could  be  kept  out  or  expelled  by 
an  inferior  law,  one  made  by  a  territorial  legisla 
ture.  Again  the  judgment  of  the  politicians,  hav 
ing  only  the  nearest  object  in  view,  proved  correct : 
Douglas  was  reflected  to  the  Senate.  But  Lincoln's 
judgment  proved  correct  also:  Douglas,  by  resort 
ing  to  the  expedient  of  his  "unfriendly  legislation 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  85 

doctrine/'  forfeited  his  last  chance  of  becoming 
President  of  the  United  States.  He  might  have 
hoped  to  win,  by  sufficient  atonement,  his  pardon 
from  the  South  for  his  opposition  to  the  Lecompton 
Constitution;  but  that  he  taught  the  people  of  the 
Territories  a  trick  by  which  they  could  defeat  what 
the  pro-slavery  men  considered  a  constitutional 
right,  and  that  he  called  that  trick  lawful,  —  this 
the  slave  power  would  never  forgive.  The  breach 
between  the  Southern  and  the  Northern  demo 
cracy  was  thenceforth  irremediable  and  fatal. 

The  presidential  election  of  1860  approached. 
The  struggle  in  Kansas,  and  the  debates  in  Con 
gress  which  accompanied  it,  and  which  not  unfre- 
quently  provoked  violent  outbursts,  continually 
stirred  the  popular  excitement.  Within  the  Demo 
cratic  party  raged  the  war  of  factions.  The  national 
Democratic  convention  met  at  Charleston  on  the 
23d  of  April,  1860.  After  a  struggle  often  days 
between  the  adherents  and  the  opponents  of  Doug 
las,  during  which  the  delegates  from  the  cotton 
States  had  withdrawn,  the  convention  adjourned 
without  having  nominated  any  candidates,  to  meet 
again  in  Baltimore  on  the  1 8th  of  June.  There  was 
no  prospect,  however,  of  reconciling  the  hostile 
elements.  It  appeared  very  probable  that  the  Bal- 


86  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

timore  convention  would  nominate  Douglas,  while 
the  seceding  Southern  Democrats  would  set  up  a 
candidate  of  their  own,  representing  extreme  pro- 
slavery  principles. 

Meanwhile,  the  national  Republican  convention 
assembled  at  Chicago  on  the  i6th  of  May,  full  of 
enthusiasm  and  hope.  The  situation  was  easily 
understood.  The  Democrats  would  have  the  South. 
In  order  to  succeed  in  the  election,  the  Republi 
cans  had  to  win,  in  addition  to  the  States  carried 
by  Fremont  in  1856,  those  that  were  classed  as 
"doubtful," — New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  and  Indi 
ana,  or  Illinois  in  the  place  of  either  New  Jersey 
or  Indiana.  The  most  eminent  Republican  states 
men  and  leaders  of  the  time  thought  of  for  the 
presidency  were  Seward  and  Chase,  both  regarded 
as  belonging  to  the  more  advanced  order  of  anti- 
slavery  men.  Of  the  two,  Seward  had  the  largest 
following,  mainly  from  New  York,  New  England, 
and  the  Northwest.  Cautious  politicians  doubted 
seriously  whether  Seward,  to  whom  some  phrases 
in  his  speeches  had  unreservedly  given  the  reputa 
tion  of  a  reckless  radical,  would  be  able  to  com 
mand  the  whole  Republican  vote  in  the  doubtful 
States.  Besides,  during  his  long  public  career  he 
had  made  enemies.  It  was  evident  that  those  who 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  87 

thought  Seward's  nomination  too  hazardous  an  ex 
periment  would  consider  Chase  unavailable  for  the 
same  reason.  They  would  then  look  round  for  an 
"available*'  man ;  and  among  the  "available"  men 
Abraham  Lincoln  was  easily  discovered  to  stand 
foremost.  His  great  debate  with  Douglas  had  given 
him  a  national  reputation.  The  people  of  the  East 
being  eager  to  see  the  hero  of  so  dramatic  a  contest, 
he  had  been  induced  to  visit  several  Eastern  cities, 
and  had  astonished  and  delighted  large  and  distin 
guished  audiences  with  speeches  of  singular  power 
and  originality.  An  address  delivered  by  him  in 
the  Cooper  Institute  in  New  York,  before  an  audi 
ence  containing  a  large  number  of  important  per 
sons,  was  then,  and  has  ever  since  been,  especially 
praised  as  one  of  the  most  logical  and  convincing 
political  speeches  ever  made  in  this  country.  The 
people  of  the  West  had  grown  proud  of  him  as  a 
distinctively  Western  great  man,  and  his  popularity 
at  home  had  some  peculiar  features  which  could  be 
expected  to  exercise  a  potent  charm.  Nor  was  Lin 
coln's  name  as  that  of  an  available  candidate  left  to 
the  chance  of  accidental  discovery.  It  is  indeed  not 
probable  that  he  thought  of  himself  as  a  presidential 
possibility,  during  his  contest  with  Douglas  for  the 
senatorship.  As  late  as  April,  1 859,  he  had  written 


88  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

to  a  friend  who  had  approached  him  on  the  subject 
that  he  did  not  think  himself  fit  for  the  presidency. 
The  vice-presidency  was  then  the  limit  of  his  ambi 
tion.  But  some  of  his  friends  in  Illinois  took  the 
matter  seriously  in  hand,  and  Lincoln,  after  some 
hesitation,  then  formally  authorized  "the  use  of  his 
name."  The  matter  was  managed  with  such  energy 
and  excellent  judgment  that  in  the  convention  he 
had  not  only  the  whole  vote  of  Illinois  to  start  with, 
but  won  votes  on  all  sides  without  offending  any 
rival.  A  large  majority  of  the  opponents  of  Seward 
went  over  to  Abraham  Lincoln,  and  gave  him  the 
nomination  on  the  third  ballot.  As  had  been  fore 
seen,  Douglas  was  nominated  by  one  wing  of  the 
Democratic  party  at  Baltimore,  while  the  extreme 
pro-slavery  wing  put  Breckinridge  into  the  field  as 
its  candidate.  After  a  campaign  conducted  with  the 
energy  of  genuine  enthusiasm  on  the  anti-slavery 
side,  the  united  Republicans  defeated  the  divided 
Democrats,  and  Lincoln  was  elected  President  by 
a  majority  of  fifty-seven  votes  in  the  electoral  col 
leges. 

The  result  of  the  election  had  hardly  been  de 
clared  when  the  disunion  movement  in  the  South, 
long  threatened  and  carefully  planned  and  pre 
pared,  broke  out  in  the  shape  of  open  revolt,  and 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  89 

nearly  a  month  before  Lincoln  could  be  inau 
gurated  as  President  of  the  United  States,  seven 
Southern  States  had  adopted  ordinances  of  seces 
sion,  formed  an  independent  confederacy,  framed 
a  constitution  for  it,  and  elected  Jefferson  Davis  its 
president,  expecting  the  other  slaveholding  States 
soon  to  join  them.  On  the  1 1  th  of  February,  1 8  6 1 , 
Lincoln  left  Springfield  for  Washington;  having, 
with  characteristic  simplicity,  asked  his  law  partner 
not  to  change  the  sign  of  the  firm  "Lincoln  and 
Herndon"  during  the  four  years'  unavoidable  ab 
sence  of  the  senior  partner,  and  having  taken  an 
affectionate  and  touching  leave  of  his  neighbors. 

The  situation  which  confronted  the  new  Presi 
dent  was  appalling:  the  larger  part  of  the  South  in 
open  rebellion,  the  rest  of  the  slaveholding  States 
wavering,  preparing  to  follow;  the  revolt  guided  by 
determined,  daring,  and  skillful  leaders;  the  South 
ern  people,  apparently  full  of  enthusiasm  and  mili 
tary  spirit,  rushing  to  arms,  some  of  the  forts  and 
arsenals  already  in  their  possession;  thegovernment 
of  the  Union,  before  the  accession  of  the  new  Presi 
dent,  in  the  hands  of  men  some  of  whom  actively 
sympathized  with  the  revolt,  while  others  were  ham 
pered  by  their  traditional  doctrines  in  dealing  with 
it,  and  really  gave  it  aid  and  comfort  by  their  irreso- 


9o  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

lute  attitude;  all  the  departments  full  of  "Southern 
sympathizers"  and  honeycombed  with  disloyalty; 
the  treasury  empty,  and  the  public  credit  at  the  low 
est  ebb;  the  arsenals  ill  supplied  with  arms,  if  not 
emptied  by  treacherous  practices;  the  regular  army 
of  insignificant  strength,  dispersed  over  an  immense 
surface,  and  deprived  by  defection  of  some  of  its 
best  officers;  the  navy  small  and  antiquated.  But 
that  was  not  all.  The  threat  of  disunion  had  so  often 
been  resorted  to  by  the  slave  power  in  years  gone 
by  that  most  Northern  people  had  ceased  to  believe 
in  its  seriousness.  But  when  disunion  actually  ap 
peared  as  a  stern  reality,  something  like  a  chill  swept 
through  the  whole  Northern  country.  A  cry  for 
union  and  peace  at  any  price  rose  on  all  sides.  De 
mocratic  partisanship  reiterated  this  cry  with  vocif 
erous  vehemence,  and  even  many  Republicans  grew 
afraid  of  the  victory  they  had  just  achieved  at  the 
ballot-box,  and  spoke  of  compromise.  The  country 
fairly  resounded  with  the  noise  of  "anti-coercion 
meetings."  Expressions  of  firm  resolution  from  de 
termined  anti-slavery  men  were  indeed  not  want 
ing,  but  they  were  for  a  while  almost  drowned  by 
a  bewildering  confusion  of  discordant  voices.  Even 
this  was  not  all.  Potent  influences  in  Europe,  with 
an  ill-concealed  desire  for  the  permanent  disrup- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  91 

tion  of  the  American  Union,  eagerly  espoused  the 
cause  of  the  Southern  seceders,  and  the  two  princi 
pal  maritime  powers  of  the  Old  World  seemed  only 
to  be  waiting  for  a  favorable  opportunity  to  lend 
them  a  helping  hand. 

This  was  the  state  of  things  to  be  mastered  by 
"honest  Abe  Lincoln"  when  he  took  his  seat  in  the 
presidential  chair, —  "honest  Abe  Lincoln,"  who 
was  so  good  natured  that  he  could  not  say  "no;" 
the  greatest  achievement  in  whose  life  had  been 
a  debate  on  the  slavery  question;  who  had  never 
been  in  any  position  of  power;  who  was  without 
the  slightest  experience  of  high  executive  duties, 
and  who  had  only  a  speaking  acquaintance  with  the 
men  upon  whose  counsel  and  cooperation  he  was 
to  depend.  Nor  was  his  accession  to  power  under 
such  circumstances  greeted  with  general  confidence 
even  by  the  members  of  his  party.  While  he  had 
indeed  won  much  popularity,  many  Republicans, 
especially  among  those  who  had  advocated  Seward's 
nomination  for  the  presidency,  with  a  feeling  little 
short  of  dismay,  saw  the  simple  "Illinois  lawyer" 
take  the  reins  of  government.  The  orators  and 
journals  of  the  opposition  were  ridiculing  and 
lampooning  him  without  measure.  Many  people 
actually  wondered  how  such  a  man  could  dare  to 


92  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

undertake  a  task  which,  as  he  himself  had  said  to 
his  neighbors  in  his  parting  speech,  was  "more  diffi 
cult  than  that  of  Washington  himself  had  been." 

But  Lincoln  brought  to  that  task,  aside  from 
other  uncommon  qualities,  the  first  requisite, — 
an  intuitive  comprehension  of  its  nature.  While 
he  did  not  indulge  in  the  delusion  that  the  Union 
could  be  maintained  or  restored  without  a  conflict  of 
arms,  he  could  indeed  not  foresee  all  the  problems 
he  would  have  to  solve.  He  instinctively  under 
stood,  however,  by  what  means  that  conflict  would 
have  to  be  conducted  by  the  government  of  a  demo 
cracy.  He  knew  that  the  impending  war,  whether 
great  or  small,  would  not  be  like  a  foreign  war,  ex 
citing  a  united  national  enthusiasm,  but  a  civil  war, 
likely  to  fan  to  uncommon  heat  the  animosities  of 
party  even  in  the  localities  controlled  by  the  gov 
ernment;  that  this  war  would  have  to  be  carried 
on,  not  by  means  of  a  ready-made  machinery,  ruled 
by  an  undisputed,  absolute  will,  but  by  means  to  be 
furnished  by  the  voluntary  action  of  the  people:  — 
armies  to  be  formed  by  voluntary  enlistment;  large 
sums  of  money  to  be  raised  by  the  people,  through 
their  representatives,  voluntarily  taxing  themselves; 
trusts  of  extraordinary  power  to  be  voluntarily 
granted;  and  war  measures,  not  seldom  restricting 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  93 

the  rights  and  liberties  to  which  the  citizen  was 
accustomed,  to  be  voluntarily  accepted  and  sub 
mitted  to  by  the  people,  or  at  least  a  large  majority 
of  them; — and  that  this  would  have  to  be  kept 
up,  not  merely  during  a  short  period  of  enthusias 
tic  excitement,  but  possibly  through  weary  years 
of  alternating  success  and  disaster,  hope  and  de 
spondency.  He  knew  that  in  order  to  steer  this 
government  by  public  opinion  successfully  through 
all  the  confusion  created  by  the  prejudices  and 
doubts  and  differences  of  sentiment  distracting  the 
popular  mind,  and  so  to  propitiate,  inspire,  mould, 
organize,  unite,  and  guide  the  popular  will  that  it 
might  give  forth  all  the  means  required  for  the  per 
formance  of  his  great  task,  he  would  have  to  take 
into  account  all  the  influences  strongly  affecting 
the  current  of  popular  thought  and  feeling,  and  to 
direct  while  appearing  to  obey. 

This  was  the  kind  of  leadership  he  intuitively 
conceived  to  be  needed  when  a  free  people  were 
to  be  led  forward  en  masse  to  overcome  a  great  com 
mon  danger  under  circumstances  of  appalling  dif 
ficulty, —  the  leadership  which  does  not  dash  ahead 
with  brilliant  daring,  no  matter  who  follows,  but 
which  is  intent  upon  rallying  all  the  available  forces, 
gathering  in  the  stragglers,  closing  up  the  column, 


94 

so  that  the  front  may  advance  well  supported.  For 
this  leadership  Abraham  Lincoln  was  admirably  fit 
ted, —  better  than  any  other  American  statesman 
of  his  day ;  for  he  understood  the  plain  people, 
with  all  their  loves  and  hates,  their  prejudices  and 
their  noble  impulses,  their  weaknesses  and  their 
strength,  as  he  understood  himself,  and  his  sym 
pathetic  nature  was  apt  to  draw  their  sympathy  to 
him. 

His  inaugural  address  foreshadowed  his  official 
course  in  characteristic  manner.  Although  yield 
ing  nothing  in  point  of  principle,  it  was  by  no 
means  a  flaming  anti-slavery  manifesto,  such  as 
would  have  pleased  the  more  ardent  Republicans. 
It  was  rather  the  entreaty  of  a  sorrowing  father 
speaking  to  his  wayward  children.  In  the  kindliest 
language  he  pointed  out  to  the  secessionists  how 
ill-advised  their  attempt  at  disunion  was,  and  why, 
for  their  own  sakes,  they  should  desist.  Almost 
plaintively  he  told  them  that,  while  it  was  not  their 
duty  to  destroy  the  Union,  it  was  his  sworn  duty  to 
preserve  it;  that  the  least  he  could  do,  under  the 
obligations  of  his  oath,  was  to  possess  and  hold  the 
property  of  the  United  States ;  that  he  hoped  to  do 
this  peaceably;  that  he  abhorred  war  for  any  pur 
pose,  and  that  they  would  have  none  unless  they 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  95 

themselves  were  the  aggressors.  It  was  a  master 
piece  of  persuasiveness ;  and  while  Lincoln  had 
accepted  many  valuable  amendments  suggested  by 
Seward,  it  was  essentially  his  own.  Probably  Lin 
coln  himself  did  not  expect  his  inaugural  address 
to  have  any  effect  upon  the  secessionists,  for  he  must 
have  known  them  to  be  resolved  upon  disunion  at 
any  cost.  But  it  was  an  appeal  to  the  wavering 
minds  in  the  North,  and  upon  them  it  made  a  pro 
found  impression.  Every  candid  man,  however 
timid  and  halting,  had  to  admit  that  the  President 
was  bound  by  his  oath  to  do  his  duty;  that  under 
that  oath  he  could  do  no  less  than  he  said  he  would 
do;  that  if  the  secessionists  resisted  such  an  appeal 
as  the  President  had  made,  they  were  bent  upon 
mischief,  and  that  the  government  must  be  sup 
ported  against  them.  The  partisan  sympathy  with 
the  Southern  insurrection  which  still  existed  in  the 
North  did  indeed  not  disappear,  but  it  diminished 
perceptibly  under  the  influence  of  such  reasoning. 
Those  who  still  resisted  it  did  so  at  the  risk  of 
appearing  unpatriotic. 

It  must  not  be  supposed,however,  that  Lincoln  at 
once  succeeded  in  pleasing  everybody,  even  among 
his  friends,  —  even  among  those  nearest  to  him.  In 
selecting  his  cabinet,  which  he  did  substantially  be- 


96  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

fore  he  left  Springfield  for  Washington,  he  thought 
it  wise  to  call  to  his  assistance  the  strong  men  of  his 
party,  especially  those  who  had  given  evidence  of 
the  support  they  commanded  as  his  competitors  in 
the  Chicago  convention.  In  them  he  found  at  the 
same  time  representatives  of  the  different  shades  of 
opinion  within  the  party,  and  of  the  different  ele 
ments —  former  Whigs  and  former  Democrats  — 
from  which  the  party  had  recruited  itself.  This  was 
sound  policy  under  the  circumstances.  It  might  in 
deed  have  been  foreseen  that  among  the  members  of 
a  cabinet  so  composed,  troublesome  disagreements 
and  rivalries  would  break  out.  But  it  was  better 
for  the  President  to  have  these  strong  and  ambitious 
men  near  him  as  his  cooperators  than  to  have  them 
as  his  critics  in  Congress,  where  their  differences 
might  have  been  composed  in  a  common  opposi 
tion  to  him.  As  members  of  his  cabinet  he  could 
hope  to  control  them,  and  to  keep  them  busily 
employed  in  the  service  of  a  common  purpose,  if 
he  had  the  strength  to  do  so.  Whether  he  did  pos 
sess  this  strength  was  soon  tested  by  a  singularly 
rude  trial. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  foremost  mem 
bers  of  his  cabinet,  Seward  and  Chase,  the  most 
eminent  Republican  statesmen,  had  felt  themselves 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  97 

wronged  by  their  party  when  in  its  national  con 
vention  it  preferred  to  them  for  the  presidency  a 
man  whom,  not  unnaturally,  they  thought  greatly 
their  inferior  in  ability  and  experience  as  well  as  in 
service.  The  soreness  of  that  disappointment  was 
intensified  when  they  saw  this  Western  man  in  the 
White  House,  with  so  much  of  rustic  manner  and 
speech  as  still  clung  to  him,  meeting  his  fellow  citi 
zens,  high  and  low,  on  a  footing  of  equality,  with 
the  simplicity  of  his  good  nature  unburdened  by 
any  conventional  dignity  of  deportment,  and  deal 
ing  with  the  great  business  of  state  in  an  easy-going, 
unmethodical,  and  apparently  somewhat  irreverent 
way.  They  did  not  understand  such  a  man.  Espe 
cially  Seward,  who,  as  Secretary  of  State,  considered 
himselfnext  to  the  Chief  Executive,  and  who  quickly 
accustomed  himself  to  giving  orders  and  making 
arrangements  upon  his  own  motion,  thought  it  ne 
cessary  that  he  should  rescue  the  direction  of  public 
affairs  from  hands  so  unskilled, and  take  full  charge 
of  them  himself.  At  the  end  of  the  first  month  of 
the  administration  he  submitted  a  "memorandum" 
to  President  Lincoln,  which  has  been  first  brought 
to  light  by  Nicolay  and  Hay,  and  is  one  of  their 
most  valuable  contributions  to  the  history  of  those 
days.  In  that  paper  Seward  actually  told  the  Presi- 


98  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

dent  that,  at  the  end  of  a  month's  administration, 
the  government  was  still  without  a  policy,  either  do 
mestic  or  foreign;  that  the  slavery  question  should 
be  eliminated  from  the  struggle  about  the  Union ; 
that  the  matter  of  the  maintenance  of  the  forts  and 
other  possessions  in  the  South  should  be  decided 
with  that  view ;  that  explanations  should  be  de 
manded  categorically  from  the  governments  of 
Spain  and  France,  which  were  then  preparing,  one 
for  the  annexation  of  San  Domingo,  and  both  for 
the  invasion  of  Mexico;  that  if  no  satisfactory  ex 
planations  were  received,  war  should  be  declared 
against  Spain  and  France  by  the  United  States; 
that  explanations  should  also  be  sought  from  Russia 
and  Great  Britain,  and  a  vigorous  continental  spirit 
of  independence  against  European  intervention  be 
aroused  all  over  the  American  continent;  that  this 
policy  should  be  incessantly  pursued  and  directed 
by  somebody;  that  either  the  President  should  de 
vote  himself  entirely  to  it,  or  devolve  the  direction 
on  some  member  of  his  cabinet,  whereupon  all 
debate  on  this  policy  must  end. 

This  could  be  understood  only  as  a  formal  de 
mand  that  the  President  should  acknowledge  his 
own  incompetency  to  perform  his  duties,  content 
himself  with  the  amusement  of  distributing  post- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  99 

offices,  and  resign  his  power  as  to  all  important 
affairs  into  the  hands  of  his  Secretary  of  State.  It 
seems  to-day  incomprehensible  how  a  statesman 
of  Seward's  calibre  could  at  that  period  conceive 
a  plan  of  policy  in  which  the  slavery  question  had 
no  place ;  a  policy  which  rested  upon  the  utterly 
delusive  assumption  that  the  secessionists,  who  had 
already  formed  their  Southern  Confederacy,  and 
were  with  stern  resolution  preparing  to  fight  for  its 
independence,  could  be  hoodwinked  back  into  the 
Union  by  some  sentimental  demonstration  against 
European  interference;  a  policy  which,  at  that  crit 
ical  moment,  would  have  involved  the  Union  in  a 
foreign  war,  thus  inviting  foreign  intervention  in 
favor  of  the  Southern  Confederacy,  and  increasing 
tenfold  its  chances  in  the  struggle  for  independence. 
But  it  is  equally  incomprehensible  how  Seward 
could  fail  to  see  that  this  demand  of  an  uncondi 
tional  surrender  was  a  mortal  insult  to  the  head  of 
the  government,  and  that  by  putting  his  proposi 
tion  on  paper  he  delivered  himself  into  the  hands 
of  the  very  man  he  had  insulted;  for  had  Lincoln, 
as  most  Presidents  would  have  done,  instantly  dis 
missed  Seward,  and  published  the  true  reason  for 
that  dismissal,  it  would  inevitably  have  been  the 
end  of  Seward's  career.  But  Lincoln  did  what  not 


ioo  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

many  of  the  noblest  and  greatest  men  in  history 
would  have  been  noble  and  great  enough  to  do. 
He  considered  that  Seward,  if  rightly  controlled, 
was  still  capable  of  rendering  great  service  to  his 
country  in  the  place  in  which  he  was.  He  ignored 
the  insult,  but  firmly  established  his  superiority. 
In  his  reply,  which  he  forthwith  dispatched,  he 
told  Seward  that  the  administration  had  a  domestic 
policy  as  laid  down  in  the  inaugural  address  with 
Seward's  approval ;  that  it  had  a  foreign  policy  as 
traced  in  Seward's  dispatches  with  the  President's 
approval;  that  if  any  policy  was  to  be  maintained 
or  changed,  he,  the  President,  was  to  direct  that  on 
his  responsibility;  and  that  in  performing  that  duty 
the  President  had  a  right  to  the  advice  of  his  sec 
retaries.  Seward's  fantastic  schemes  of  foreign  war 
and  continental  policies  Lincoln  brushed  aside  by 
passing  them  over  in  silence.  Nothing  more  was 
said.  Seward  must  have  felt  that  he  was  at  the  mercy 
of  a  superior  man ;  that  his  offensive  proposition 
had  been  generously  pardoned  as  a  temporary  ab 
erration  of  a  great  mind,  and  that  he  could  atone 
for  it  only  by  devoted  personal  loyalty.  This  he 
did.  He  was  thoroughly  subdued,  and  thenceforth 
submitted  to  Lincoln  his  dispatches  for  revision  and 
amendment  without  a  murmur.  The  war  with 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  101 

European  nations  was  no  longer  thought  of;  the 
slavery  question  found  in  due  time  its  proper  place 
in  the  struggle  for  the  Union;  and  when,  at  a  later 
period,  the  dismissal  of  Seward  was  demanded  by 
dissatisfied  senators  who  attributed  to  him  the 
shortcomings  of  the  administration,  Lincoln  stood 
stoutly  by  his  faithful  Secretary  of  State. 

Chase,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  a  man  of 
superb  presence,  of  eminent  ability  and  ardent  pa 
triotism,  of  great  natural  dignity  and  a  certain  out 
ward  coldness  of  manner,  which  made  him  appear 
more  difficult  of  approach  than  he  really  was,  did 
not  permit  his  disappointment  to  burst  out  in  such 
extravagant  demonstrations.  But  Lincoln's  ways 
were  so  essentially  different  from  his  that  they  never 
became  quite  intelligible,  and  certainly  not  congen 
ial  to  him.  It  might,  perhaps,  have  been  better  had 
there  been,  at  the  beginning  of  the  administration, 
some  decided  clash  between  Lincoln  and  Chase,  as 
there  was  between  Lincoln  and  Seward,  to  bring 
on  a  full  mutual  explanation,  and  to  make  Chase 
appreciate  the  real  seriousness  of  Lincoln's  nature. 
But  as  it  was,  their  relations  always  remained  some 
what  formal,  and  Chase  never  felt  quite  at  ease 
under  a  chief  whom  he  could  not  understand,  and 
whose  character  and  powers  he  never  learned  to 


102  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

esteem  at  their  true  value.  At  the  same  time,  he 
devoted  himself  zealously  to  the  duties  of  his  de 
partment,  and  did  the  country  arduous  service 
under  circumstances  of  extreme  difficulty.  Nobody 
recognized  this  more  heartily  than  Lincoln  him 
self,  and  they  managed  to  work  together  until  near 
the  end  of  Lincoln's  first  presidential  term,  when 
Chase,  after  some  disagreements  concerning  ap 
pointments  to  office,  resigned  from  the  treasury; 
and  after  Taney's  death,  the  President  made  him 
Chief  Justice. 

The  rest  of  the  cabinet  consisted  of  men  of  less 
eminence,  who  subordinated  themselves  more  easily. 
In  January,  1862,  Lincoln  found  it  necessary  to 
bow  Cameron  out  of  the  war  office,  and  to  put  in 
his  place  Edwin  M.  Stanton,  a  man  of  intensely 
practical  mind,  vehement  impulses,  fierce  positive- 
ness,  ruthless  energy,  immense  working  power,  lofty 
patriotism,  and  severest  devotion  to  duty.  He  ac 
cepted  the  war  office,  not  as  a  partisan,  for  he  had 
never  been  a  Republican,  but  only  to  do  all  he 
could  in  "helping  to  save  the  country."  The  man 
ner  in  which  Lincoln  succeeded  in  taming  this  lion 
to  his  will,  by  frankly  recognizing  his  great  quali 
ties,  by  giving  him  the  most  generous  confidence, 
by  aiding  him  in  his  work  to  the  full  of  his  power, 


-V/V/T'/V/ 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  103 

by  kindly  concession  or  affectionate  persuasiveness 
in  cases  of  differing  opinions,  or,  when  it  was  neces 
sary,  by  firm  assertions  of  superior  authority,  bears 
thehighest  testimony  to  his  skill  in  the  management 
of  men.  Stanton,  who  had  entered  the  service  with 
rather  a  mean  opinion  of  Lincoln's  character  and 
capacity,  became  one  of  his  warmest,  most  devoted, 
and  most  admiring  friends,  and  with  none  of  his 
secretaries  was  Lincoln's  intercourse  more  intimate. 
To  take  advice  with  candid  readiness,  and  to  weigh 
it  without  any  pride  of  his  own  opinion,  was  one  of 
Lincoln's  preeminent  virtues ;  but  he  had  not  long 
presided  over  his  cabinet  council  when  his  was  felt 
by  all  its  members  to  be  the  ruling  mind. 

The  cautious  policy  foreshadowed  in  his  inau 
gural  address,  and  pursued  during  the  first  period 
of  the  civil  war,  was  far  from  satisfying  all  his  party 
friends.  The  ardent  spirits  among  the  Union  men 
thought  that  the  whole  North  should  at  once  be 
called  to  arms,  to  crush  the  rebellion  by  one  power 
ful  blow.  The  ardent  spirits  among  the  anti-slav 
ery  men  insisted  that,  slavery  having  brought  forth 
the  rebellion,  this  powerful  blow  should  at  once  be 
aimed  at  slavery.  Both  complained  that  the  admin 
istration  was  spiritless,  undecided,  and  lamentably 
slow  in  its  proceedings.  Lincoln  reasoned  other- 


io4  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

wise.  The  ways  of  thinking  and  feeling  of  the  masses, 
of  the  plain  people,  were  constantly  present  to  his 
mind.  The  masses,  the  plain  people,  had  to  furnish 
the  men  for  the  fighting,  if  fighting  was  to  be  done. 
He  believed  that  the  plain  people  would  be  ready  to 
fight  when  it  clearly  appeared  necessary,  and  that 
they  would  feel  that  necessity  when  they  felt  them 
selves  attacked.  He  therefore  waited  until  the  ene 
mies  of  the  Union  struck  the  first  blow.  As  soon  as, 
on  the  1 2th  of  April,  1861,  the  first  gun  was  fired 
in  Charleston  harbor  on  the  Union  flag  upon  Fort 
Sumter,  the  call  was  sounded,  and  the  Northern 
people  rushed  to  arms. 

Lincoln  knew  that  the  plain  people  were  now 
indeed  ready  to  fight  in  defense  of  the  Union,  but 
not  yet  ready  to  fight  for  the  destruction  of  slavery. 
He  declared  openly  that  he  had  a  right  to  summon 
the  people  to  fight  for  the  Union,  but  not  to  sum 
mon  them  to  fight  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  as  a 
primary  object;  and  this  declaration  gave  him  num 
berless  soldiers  for  the  Union  who  at  that  period 
would  have  hesitated  to  do  battle  against  the  insti 
tution  of  slavery.  For  a  time  he  succeeded  in  ren 
dering  harmless  the  cry  of  the  partisan  opposition 
that  the  Republican  administration  was  perverting 
the  war  for  the  Union  into  an  "abolition  war."  But 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  105 

whe  n  he  went  so  far  as  to  countermand  the  acts  of 
some  generals  in  the  field,  looking  to  the  emanci 
pation  of  the  slaves  in  the  districts  covered  by  their 
commands,  loud  complaints  arose  from  earnest  anti- 
slavery  men,  who  accused  the  President  of  turning 
his  back  upon  the  anti-slavery  cause.  Many  of  these 
anti-slavery  men  will  now,  after  a  calm  retrospect, 
be  willing  to  admit  that  it  would  have  been  a  haz 
ardous  policy  to  endanger,  by  precipitating  a  de 
monstrative  fight  against  slavery,  the  success  of  the 
struggle  for  the  Union. 

Lincoln's  views  and  feelings  concerning  slavery 
had  not  changed.  Those  who  conversed  with  him 
intimately  upon  the  subject  at  that  period  know 
that  he  did  not  expect  slavery  long  to  survive  the 
triumph  of  the  Union,  even  if  it  were  not  immedi 
ately  destroyed  by  the  war.  In  this  he  was  right. 
Had  the  Union  armies  achieved  a  decisive  victory  in 
an  early  period  of  the  conflict,  and  had  the  seceded 
States  been  received  back  with  slavery,  the  "  slave 
power"  would  then  have  been  a  defeated  power, — 
defeated  in  an  attempt  to  carry  out  its  most  effec 
tive  threat.  It  would  have  lost  its  prestige.  Its 
menaces  would  have  been  hollow  sound,  and  ceased 
to  make  any  one  afraid.  It  could  no  longer  have 
hoped  to  expand,  to  maintain  an  equilibrium  in  any 


io6  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

branch  of  Congress,  and  to  control  the  government. 
The  victorious  free  States  would  have  largely  over 
balanced  it.  It  would  no  longer  have  been  able  to 
withstand  the  onset  of  a  hostile  age.  It  could  no 
longer  have  ruled, — and  slavery  had  to  rule  in  order 
to  live.  It  would  have  lingered  for  a  while,  but 
it  would  surely  have  been  "  in  the  course  of  ulti 
mate  extinction."  A  prolonged  war  precipitated 
the  destruction  of  slavery ;  a  short  war  might  only 
have  prolonged  its  death  struggle.  Lincoln  saw  this 
clearly;  but  he  saw  also  that,  in  a  protracted  death 
struggle,  it  might  still  have  kept  disloyal  sentiments 
alive,  bred  distracting  commotions,  and  caused  great 
mischief  to  the  country.  He  therefore  hoped  that 
slavery  would  not  survive  the  war. 

But  the  question  how  he  could  rightfully  employ 
his  power  to  bring  on  its  speedy  destruction  was  to 
him  not  a  question  of  mere  sentiment.  He  himself 
set  forth  his  reasoning  upon  it,  at  a  later  period,  in 
one  of  his  inimitable  letters.  "I  am  naturally  anti- 
slavery,"  said  he.  "If  slavery  is  not  wrong,  nothing 
is  wrong.  I  cannot  remember  the  time  when  I  did 
not  so  think  and  feel.  And  yet  I  have  never  under 
stood  that  the  presidency  conferred  upon  mean  un 
restricted  right  to  act  upon  that  judgment  and  feel 
ing.  It  was  in  the  oath  I  took  that  I  would,  to  the 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  107 

best  of  my  ability,  preserve,  protect,  and  defend  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States.  I  could  not  take 
the  office  without  taking  the  oath.  Nor  was  it  my 
view  that  I  might  take  an  oath  to  get  power,  and 
break  the  oath  in  using  that  power.  I  understood, 
too,  that,  in  ordinary  civil  administration,  this  oath 
even  forbade  me  practically  to  indulge  my  private 
abstract  judgment  on  the  moral  question  of  slavery. 
I  did  understand,  however,  also,  that  my  oath  im 
posed  upon  me  the  duty  of  preserving,  to  the  best 
of  my  ability,  by  every  indispensable  means,  that 
government,  that  nation,  of  which  the  Constitu 
tion  was  the  organic  law.  I  could  not  feel  that,  to 
the  best  of  my  ability,  I  had  even  tried  to  preserve 
the  Constitution  if,  to  save  slavery,  or  any  minor 
matter,  I  should  permit  the  wreck  of  government, 
country,  and  Constitution  all  together."  In  other 
words,  if  the  salvation  of  the  government,  the  Con 
stitution,  and  the  Union  demanded  the  destruction 
of  slavery,  he  felt  it  to  be  not  only  his  right,  but  his 
sworn  duty  to  destroy  it.  Its  destruction  became  a 
necessity  of  the  war  for  the  Union. 

As  the  war  dragged  on  and  disaster  followed  dis 
aster,  the  sense  of  that  necessity  steadily  grew  upon 
him.  Early  in  1 862,  as  some  of  his  friends  well  re- 
member,he  saw,  what  Seward  seemed  not  to  see,  that 


io8  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

to  give  the  war  for  the  Union  an  anti-slavery  charac 
ter  was  the  surest  means  to  prevent  the  recognition 
of  the  Southern  Confederacy  as  an  independent 
nation  by  European  powers;  that,  slavery  being 
abhorred  by  the  moral  sense  of  civilized  mankind, 
no  European  government  would  dare  to  offer  so 
gross  an  insult  to  the  public  opinion  of  its  people  as 
openly  to  favor  the  creation  of  a  state  founded  upon 
slavery  to  the  prejudice  of  an  existing  nation  fight 
ing  against  slavery.  He  saw  also  that  slavery  un 
touched  was  to  the  rebellion  an  element  of  power, 
and  that  in  order  to  overcome  that  power  it  was 
necessary  to  turn  it  into  an  element  of  weakness. 
Still,  he  felt  no  assurance  that  the  plain  people  were 
prepared  for  so  radical  a  measure  as  the  emancipa 
tion  of  the  slaves  by  act  of  the  government,  and 
he  anxiously  considered  that,  if  they  were  not,  this 
great  step  might,  by  exciting  dissension  at  the  North, 
injure  the  cause  of  the  Union  in  one  quarter  more 
than  it  would  help  it  in  another.  He  heartily  wel 
comed  an  effort  made  in  New  York  to  mould  and 
stimulate  public  sentiment  on  the  slavery  question 
by  public  meetings  boldly  pronouncing  for  eman 
cipation.  At  the  same  time  he  himself  cautiously 
advanced  with  a  recommendation,  expressed  in  a 
special  message  to  Congress,  that  the  United  States 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  109 

should  cooperate  with  any  State  which  might  adopt 
the  gradual  abolishment  of  slavery,  giving  such  State 
pecuniary  aid  to  compensate  the  former  owners  of 
emancipated  slaves.  The  discussion  was  started,  and 
spread  rapidly.  Congress  adopted  the  resolution 
recommended,  and  soon  went  a  step  farther  in 
passing  a  bill  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  District  of  Co 
lumbia.  The  plain  people  began  to  look  at  emanci 
pation  on  a  larger  scale,  as  a  thing  to  be  considered 
seriously  by  patriotic  citizens ;  and  soon  Lincoln 
thought  that  the  time  was  ripe,  and  that  the  edict 
of  freedom  could  be  ventured  upon  without  danger 
of  serious  confusion  in  the  Union  ranks. 

The  failure  of  McClellan's  movement  upon  Rich 
mond  increased  immensely  the  prestige  of  the  en 
emy.  The  need  of  some  great  act  to  stimulate  the 
vitality  of  the  Union  cause  seemed  to  grow  daily 
more  pressing.  On  July  21,  1862,  Lincoln  sur 
prised  his  cabinet  with  the  draught  of  a  proclama 
tion  declaring  free  the  slaves  in  all  the  States  that 
should  be  still  in  rebellion  against  the  United  States 
on  the  i  st  of  January,  1863.  As  to  the  matter  itself 
he  announced  that  he  had  fully  made  up  his  mind; 
he  invited  advice  only  concerning  the  form  and  the 
time  of  publication.  Seward  suggested  that  the 
proclamation,  if  then  brought  out,  amidst  disaster 


no  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

and  distress,  would  sound  like  the  last  shriek  of  a 
perishing  cause.  Lincoln  accepted  the  suggestion, 
and  the  proclamation  was  postponed.  Another 
defeat  followed,  the  second  at  Bull  Run.  But 
when, after  that  battle,  the  Confederate  army,under 
Lee,  crossed  the  Potomac  and  invaded  Maryland, 
Lincoln  vowed  in  his  heart  that,  if  the  Union  army 
were  now  blessed  with  success,  the  decree  of  free 
dom  should  surely  be  issued.  The  victory  of  Antie- 
tam  was  won  on  September  17,  and  the  prelimi 
nary  Emancipation  Proclamation  came  forth  on 
the  2  2d.  It  was  Lincoln's  own  resolution  and  act; 
but  practically  it  bound  the  nation,  and  permit 
ted  no  step  backward.  In  spite  of  its  limitations,  it 
was  the  actual  abolition  of  slavery.  Thus  he  wrote 
his  name  upon  the  books  of  history  with  the  title 
dearest  to  his  heart,  —  the  liberator  of  the  slave. 

It  is  true,  the  great  proclamation,  which  stamped 
the  war  as  one  for  "union  and  freedom,"  did  not 
at  once  mark  the  turning  of  the  tide  on  the  field 
of  military  operations.  There  were  more  disasters, 
—  Fredericksburg  and  Chancellorsville.  But  with 
Gettysburg  and  Vicksburg  the  whole  aspect  of  the 
war  changed.  Step  by  step,  now  more  slowly,  then 
more  rapidly,  but  with  increasing  steadiness,  the  flag 
of  the  Union  advanced  from  field  to  field  toward 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  in 

the  final  consummation.  The  decree  of  emancipa 
tion  was  naturally  followed  by  the  enlistment  of 
emancipated  negroes  in  the  Union  armies.  This 
measure  had  a  farther-reaching  effect  than  merely 
giving  the  Union  armies  an  increased  supply  of  men. 
The  laboring  force  of  the  rebellion  was  hopelessly 
disorganized.  The  war  became  like  a  problem  of 
arithmetic.  As  the  Union  armies  pushed  forward, 
the  area  from  which  the  Southern  Confederacy  could 
draw  recruits  and  supplies  constantly  grew  smaller, 
while  the  area  from  which  the  Union  recruited  its 
strength  constantly  grew  larger :  and  everywhere, 
even  within  the  Southern  lines,  the  Union  had  its 
allies.  The  fate  of  the  rebellion  was  then  virtually 
decided;  but  it  still  required  much  bloody  work  to 
convince  the  brave  warriors  who  fought  for  it  that 
they  were  really  beaten. 

Neither  did  the  Emancipation  Proclamation 
forthwith  command  universal  assent  among  the 
people  who  were  loyal  to  the  Union.  There  were 
even  signs  of  a  reaction  against  the  administration  in 
the  fall  elections  of  1862,  seemingly  justifying  the 
opinion,  entertained  by  many,  that  the  President 
had  really  anticipated  the  development  of  popular 
feeling.  The  cry  that  the  war  for  the  Union  had 
been  turned  into  an  "abolition  war"  was  raised 


ii2  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

again  by  the  opposition,  and  more  loudly  than  ever. 
But  the  good  sense  and  patriotic  instincts  of  the 
plain  people  gradually  marshaled  themselves  on 
Lincoln's  side,  and  he  lost  no  opportunity  to  help 
on  this  process  by  personal  argument  and  admo 
nition.  There  never  has  been  a  President  in  such 
constant  and  active  contact  with  the  public  opin 
ion  of  the  country,  as  there  never  has  been  a  Presi 
dent  who,  while  at  the  head  of  the  government, 
remained  so  near  to  the  people.  Beyond  the  cir 
cle  of  those  who  had  long  known  him,  the  feeling 
steadily  grew  that  the  man  in  the  White  House  was 
"honest  Abe  Lincoln"  still,  and  that  every  citizen 
might  approach  him  with  complaint,  expostulation, 
or  advice,  without  danger  of  meeting  a  rebuff  from 
power-proud  authority  or  humiliating  condescen 
sion;  and  this  privilege  was  used  by  so  many  and 
with  such  unsparing  freedom  that  only  superhuman 
patience  could  have  endured  it  all.  There  are  men 
now  living  who  would  to-day  read  with  amazement, 
if  not  regret,  what  they  then  ventured  to  say  or  write 
to  him.  But  Lincoln  repelled  no  one  whom  he  be 
lieved  to  speak  to  him  in  good  faith  and  with  patri 
otic  purpose.  No  good  advice  would  go  unheeded. 
No  candid  criticism  would  offend  him.  No  honest 
opposition,  while  it  might  pain  him,  would  pro- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  113 

duce  a  lasting  alienation  of  feeling  between  him  and 
the  opponent.  It  may  truly  be  said  that  few  men 
in  power  have  ever  been  exposed  to  more  daring 
attempts  to  direct  their  course,  to  severer  censure 
of  their  acts,  and  to  more  cruel  misrepresentation 
of  their  motives.  And  all  this  he  met  with  that 
good-natured  humor  peculiarly  his  own,  and  with 
untiring  effort  to  see  the  right  and  to  impress  it 
upon  those  who  differed  from  him.  The  conversa 
tions  he  had  and  the  correspondence  he  carried  on 
upon  matters  of  public  interest,  not  only  with  men 
in  official  position,  but  with  private  citizens,  were 
almost  unceasing,  and  in  a  large  number  of  public 
letters,  written  ostensibly  to  meetings,  or  commit 
tees,  or  persons  of  importance,  he  addressed  him 
self  directly  to  the  popular  mind.  Most  of  these 
letters  stand  among  the  finest  monuments  of  our 
political  literature.  Thus  he  presented  the  singu 
lar  spectacle  of  a  President  who,  in  the  midst  of  a 
great  civil  war,  with  unprecedented  duties  weighing 
upon  him,  was  constantly  in  person  debating  the 
great  features  of  his  policy  with  the  people. 

While  in  this  manner  he  exercised  an  ever-in 
creasing  influence  upon  the  popular  understand 
ing,  his  sympathetic  nature  endeared  him  more  and 
more  to  the  popular  heart.  In  vain  did  journals  and 


ii4  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

speakers  of  the  opposition  represent  him  as  a  light- 
minded  trifler,  who  amused  himself  with  frivolous 
story-telling  and  coarse  jokes,  while  the  blood 
of  the  people  was  flowing  in  streams.  The  people 
knew  that  the  man  at  the  head  of  affairs,  on  whose 
haggard  face  the  twinkle  of  humor  so  frequently 
changed  into  an  expression  of  profoundest  sadness, 
was  more  than  any  other  deeply  distressed  by  the  suf 
fering  he  witnessed;  that  he  felt  the  pain  of  every 
wound  that  was  inflicted  on  the  battlefield,  and 
the  anguish  of  every  woman  or  child  who  had  lost 
husband  or  father;  that  whenever  he  could  he  was 
eager  to  alleviate  sorrow,  and  that  his  mercy  was 
never  implored  in  vain.  They  looked  to  him  as  one 
who  was  with  them  and  of  them  in  all  their  hopes 
and  fears,  their  joys  and  sorrows,  —  who  laughed 
with  them  and  wept  with  them;  and  as  his  heart 
was  theirs,  so  their  hearts  turned  to  him.  His  pop 
ularity  was  far  different  from  that  of  Washington, 
who  was  revered  with  awe,  or  that  of  Jackson,  the 
unconquerable  hero,  for  whom  party  enthusiasm 
never  grew  weary  of  shouting.  To  Abraham  Lin 
coln  the  people  became  bound  by  a  genuine  senti 
mental  attachment.  It  was  not  a  matter  of  respect, 
or  confidence,  or  party  pride,  for  this  feeling  spread 
far  beyond  the  boundary  lines  of  his  party ;  it  was 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  115 

an  affair  of  the  heart,  independent  of  mere  reason 
ing.  When  the  soldiers  in  the  field  or  their  folks 
at  home  spoke  of  "  Father  Abraham,"  there  was 
no  cant  in  it.  They  felt  that  their  President  was 
really  caring  for  them  as  a  father  would,  and  that 
they  could  go  to  him,  every  one  of  them,  as  they 
would  go  to  a  father,  and  talk  to  him  of  what  trou 
bled  them,  sure  to  find  a  willing  ear  and  tender  sym 
pathy.  Thus,  their  President,  and  his  cause,  and  his 
endeavors,  and  his  success  gradually  became  to  them 
almost  matters  of  family  concern.  And  this  popu 
larity  carried  him  triumphantly  through  the  presi 
dential  election  of  1864,  in  spite  of  an  opposition 
within  his  own  party  which  at  first  seemed  very 
formidable. 

Many  of  the  radical  anti-slavery  men  were  never 
quite  satisfied  with  Lincoln's  ways  of  meeting  the 
problems  of  the  time.  They  were  very  earnest  and 
mostly  very  able  men,  who  had  positive  ideas  as  to 
"  how  this  rebellion  should  be  put  down."  They 
would  not  recognize  the  necessity  of  measuring  the 
steps  of  the  government  according  to  the  progress 
of  opinion  among  the  plain  people.  They  criticised 
Lincoln's  cautious  management  as  irresolute,  halt 
ing,  lacking  in  definite  purpose  and  in  energy ;  he 
should  not  have  delayed  emancipation  so  long;  he 


n6  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

should  not  have  confided  important  commands  to 
men  of  doubtful  views  as  to  slavery;  he  should  have 
authorized  military  commanders  to  set  the  slaves 
free  as  they  went  on ;  he  dealt  too  leniently  with 
unsuccessful  generals;  he  should  have  put  down 
all  factious  opposition  with  a  strong  hand  instead 
of  trying  to  pacify  it;  he  should  have  given  the 
people  accomplished  facts  instead  of  arguing  with 
them,  and  so  on.  It  is  true,  these  criticisms  were  not 
always  entirely  unfounded.  Lincoln's  policy  had, 
with  the  virtues  of  democratic  government,  some 
of  its  weaknesses,  which  in  the  presence  of  pressing 
exigencies  were  apt  to  deprive  governmental  action 
of  the  necessary  vigor;  and  his  kindness  of  heart, 
his  disposition  always  to  respect  the  feelings  of 
others,  frequently  made  him  recoil  from  anything 
like  severity,  even  when  severity  was  urgently  called 
for.  But  many  of  his  radical  critics  have  since  then 
revised  their  judgment  sufficiently  to  admit  that 
Lincoln's  policy  was,  on  the  whole,  the  wisest  and 
safest;  that  a  policy  of  heroic  methods,  while  it  has 
sometimes  accomplished  great  results,  could  in  a 
democracy  like  ours  be  maintained  only  by  con 
stant  success;  that  it  would  have  quickly  broken 
down  under  the  weight  of  disaster;  that  it  might 
have  been  successful  from  the  start,  had  the  Union, 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  117 

at  the  beginning  of  the  conflict,  had  its  Grants  and 
Shermans  and  Sheridans,  its  Farraguts  and  Porters, 
fully  matured  at  the  head  of  its  forces;  but  that, 
as  the  great  commanders  had  to  be  evolved  slowly 
from  the  developments  of  the  war,  constant  success 
could  not  be  counted  upon,  and  it  was  best  to  fol 
low  a  policy  which  was  in  friendly  contact  with  the 
popular  force,  and  therefore  more  fit  to  stand  the 
trial  of  misfortune  on  the  battlefield.  But  at  that 
period  they  thought  differently,  and  their  dissatis 
faction  with  Lincoln's  doings  was  greatly  increased 
by  the  steps  he  took  toward  the  reconstruction  of 
rebel  States  then  partially  in  possession  of  the  Union 
forces. 

In  December,  1863,  Lincoln  issued  an  amnesty 
proclamation,  offering  pardon  to  all  implicated  in 
the  rebellion,  with  certain  specified  exceptions,  on 
condition  of  their  taking  and  maintaining  an  oath 
to  support  the  Constitution  and  obey  the  laws  of 
the  United  States  and  the  proclamations  of  the  Pre 
sident  with  regard  to  slaves;  and  also  promising 
that  when,  in  any  of  the  rebel  States,  a  number  of 
citizens  equal  to  one  tenth  of  the  voters  in  1860 
should  reestablish  a  state  government  in  conformity 
with  the  oath  above  mentioned,  such  should  be 
recognized  by  the  Executive  as  the  true  govern- 


n8  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

ment  of  the  State.  The  proclamation  seemed  at  first 
to  be  received  with  general  favor.  But  soon  another 
scheme  of  reconstruction,  much  more  stringent 
in  its  provisions,  was  put  forward  in  the  House  of 
Representatives  by  Henry  Winter  Davis.  Benjamin 
Wade  championed  it  in  the  Senate.  It  passed  in  the 
closing  moments  of  the  session  in  July,  1 864,  and 
Lincoln,  instead  of  making  it  a  law  by  his  signa 
ture,  embodied  the  text  of  it  in  a  proclamation  as 
a  plan  of  reconstruction  worthy  of  being  earnestly 
considered.  The  differences  of  opinion  concerning 
this  subject  had  only  intensified  the  feeling  against 
Lincoln  which  had  long  been  nursed  among  the 
radicals,  and  some  of  them  openly  declared  their 
purpose  of  resisting  his  reelection  to  the  presidency. 
Similar  sentiments  were  manifested  by  the  advanced 
anti-slavery  men  of  Missouri,  who,  in  their  hot  fac 
tion-fight  with  the  "  conservatives "  of  that  State, 
had  not  received  from  Lincoln  the  active  support 
they  demanded.  Still  another  class  of  Union  men, 
mainly  in  the  East,  gravely  shook  their  heads  when 
considering  the  question  whether  Lincoln  should  be 
reflected.  Theywere  those  who  cherished  in  their 
minds  an  ideal  of  statesmanship  and  of  personal 
bearing  in  high  office  with  which,  in  their  opinion, 
Lincoln's  individuality  was  much  out  of  accord. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  119 

They  were  shocked  when  they  heard  him  cap  an 
argument  upon  grave  affairs  of  state  with  a  story 
about  "a  man  out  in  Sangamon  County," — a  story, 
to  be  sure,  strikingly  clinching  his  point,  but  sadly 
lacking  in  dignity.  They  could  not  understand  the 
man  who  was  capable,  in  opening  a  cabinet  meet 
ing,  of  reading  to  his  secretaries  a  funny  chapter 
from  a  recent  book  of  Artemus  Ward,  with  which 
in  an  unoccupied  moment  he  had  relieved  his  care- 
burdened  mind,  and  who  then  solemnly  informed 
the  executive  council  that  he  had  vowed  in  his  heart 
to  issue  a  proclamation  emancipating  the  slaves  as 
soon  as  God  blessed  the  Union  arms  with  another 
victory.  They  were  alarmed  at  the  weakness  of 
a  President  who  would  indeed  resist  the  urgent 
remonstrances  of  statesmen  against  his  policy,  but 
could  not  resist  the  prayer  of  an  old  woman  for 
the  pardon  of  a  soldier  who  was  sentenced  to  be 
shot  for  desertion.  Such  men,  mostly  sincere  and 
ardent  patriots,  not  only  wished,  but  earnestly  set  to 
work,  to  prevent  Lincoln's  renomination.  Not  a 
few  of  them  actually  believed,  in  1863,  that,  if  the 
national  convention  of  the  Union  party  were  held 
then,  Lincoln  would  not  be  supported  by  the  del 
egation  of  a  single  State.  But  when  the  conven 
tion  met  at  Baltimore,  in  June,  1 864,  the  voice  of 


120  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

the  people  was  heard.  On  the  first  ballot  Lincoln 
received  the  votes  of  the  delegations  from  all  the 
States  except  Missouri;  and  even  the  Missourians 
turned  over  their  votes  to  him  before  the  result  of 
the  ballot  was  declared. 

But  even  after  his  renomination,  the  opposition 
to  Lincoln  within  the  ranks  of  the  Union  party  did 
not  subside.  A  convention,  called  by  the  dissatis 
fied  radicals  in  Missouri,  and  favored  by  men  of  a 
similar  way  of  thinking  in  other  States,  had  been 
held  already  in  May,  and  had  nominated  as  its  can 
didate  for  the  presidency  General  Fremont.  He,  in 
deed,  did  not  attract  a  strong  following,  but  oppo 
sition  movements  from  different  quarters  appeared 
more  formidable.  Henry  Winter  Davis  and  Benja 
min  Wade  assailed  Lincoln  in  a  flaming  manifesto. 
Other  Union  men,  of  undoubted  patriotism  and 
high  standing,  persuaded  themselves,  and  sought  to 
persuade  the  people,  that  Lincoln's  renomination 
was  ill  advised  and  dangerous  to  the  Union  cause. 
As  the  Democrats  had  put  off" their  convention  until 
the  2  Qth  of  August,  the  Union  party  had,  during 
the  larger  part  of  the  summer,  no  opposing  candi 
date  and  platform  to  attack,  and  the  political  cam 
paign  languished.  Neither  were  the  tidings  from 
the  theatre  of  war  of  a  cheering  character.  The  ter- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  121 

rible  losses  suffered  by  Grant's  army  in  the  battles 
of  the  Wilderness  spread  general  gloom.  Sherman 
seemed  for  a  while  to  be  in  a  precarious  position 
before  Atlanta.  The  opposition  to  Lincoln  within 
the  Union  party  grew  louder  in  its  complaints  and 
discouraging  predictions.  Earnest  demands  were 
heard  that  his  candidacy  should  be  withdrawn.  Lin 
coln  himself,  not  knowing  how  strongly  the  masses 
were  attached  to  him,  was  haunted  by  dark  forebod 
ings  of  defeat.  Then  the  scene  suddenly  changed 
as  if  by  magic.  The  Democrats,  in  their  national 
convention,  declared  the  war  a  failure,  demanded, 
substantially,  peace  at  any  price,  and  nominated 
on  such  a  platform  General  McClellan  as  their  can 
didate.  Their  convention  had  hardly  adjourned 
when  the  capture  of  Atlanta  gave  a  new  aspect  to 
the  military  situation.  It  was  like  a  sun-ray  burst 
ing  through  a  dark  cloud.  The  rank  and  file  of  the 
Union  party  rose  with  rapidly  growing  enthusiasm. 
The  song  "We  are  coming,  Father  Abraham,  three 
hundred  thousand  strong,"  resounded  all  over  the 
land.  Long  before  the  decisive  day  arrived,  the  re 
sult  was  beyond  doubt,  and  Lincoln  was  reflected 
President  by  overwhelming  majorities.  The  elec 
tion  over,  even  his  severest  critics  found  themselves 
forced  to  admit  that  Lincoln  was  the  only  possi- 


122  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

ble  candidate  for  the  Union  party  in  1864,  and 
that  neither  political  combinations  nor  campaign 
speeches,  nor  even  victories  in  the  field,  were  needed 
to  insure  his  success.  The  plain  people  had  all  the 
while  been  satisfied  with  Abraham  Lincoln  :  they 
confided  in  him;  they  loved  him;  they  felt  them 
selves  near  to  him;  they  saw  personified  in  him  the 
cause  of  Union  and  freedom;  and  they  went  to  the 
ballot-box  for  him  in  their  strength. 

The  hour  of  triumph  called  out  the  character 
istic  impulses  of  his  nature.  The  opposition  within 
the  Union  party  had  stung  him  to  the  quick.  Now 
he  had  his  opponents  before  him,  bafHed  and 
humiliated.  Not  a  moment  did  he  lose  to  stretch 
out  the  hand  of  friendship  to  all.  "Now  that  the 
election  is  over,"  he  said,  in  response  to  a  serenade, 
"may  not  all,  having  a  common  interest,  reunite  in 
a  common  effort  to  save  our  common  country? 
For  my  own  part,  I  have  striven,  and  will  strive,  to 
place  no  obstacle  in  the  way.  So  long  as  I  have 
been  here  I  have  not  willingly  planted  a  thorn  in 
any  man's  bosom.  While  I  am  deeply  sensible  to  the 
high  compliment  of  a  reelection,  it  adds  nothing  to 
my  satisfaction  that  any  other  man  may  be  pained 
or  disappointed  by  the  result.  May  I  ask  those  who 
were  with  me  to  join  with  me  in  the  same  spirit 


y/   ('/*  "'/  y 

fsr    Sff.J*  /sW'.  /<rff 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  123 

toward  those  who  were  against  me?"  This  was 
Abraham  Lincoln's  character  as  tested  in  the  fur 
nace  of  prosperity. 

The  war  was  virtually  decided,  but  not  yet  ended. 
Sherman  was  irresistibly  carrying  the  Union  flag 
through  the  South.  Grant  had  his  iron  hand  upon 
the  ramparts  of  Richmond.  The  days  of  the  Con 
federacy  were  evidently  numbered.  Only  the  last 
blow  remained  to  be  struck.  Then  Lincoln's  sec 
ond  inauguration  came,  and  with  it  his  second 
inaugural  address.  Lincoln's  famous  "Gettysburg 
speech"  has  been  much  and  justly  admired.  But 
far  greater,  as  well  as  far  more  characteristic,  was 
that  inaugural  in  which  he  poured  out  the  whole 
devotion  and  tenderness  of  his  great  soul.  It  had 
all  the  solemnity  of  a  father's  last  admonition  and 
blessing  to  his  children  before  he  lay  down  to  die. 
These  were  its  closing  words:  "  Fondly  do  we  hope, 
fervently  do  we  pray,  that  this  mighty  scourge  of 
war  may  speedily  pass  away.  Yet  if  God  wills  that 
it  continue  until  all  the  wealth  piled  up  by  the 
bondman's  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  of  unre 
quited  toil  shall  be  sunk,  and  until  every  drop  of 
blood  drawn  with  the  lash  shall  be  paid  by  another 
drawn  with  the  sword,  as  was  said  three  thousand 
years  ago,so  still  it  must  besaid,  'Thejudgments  of 


124  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

the  Lord  are  true  and  righteous  altogether.'  With 
malice  toward  none,  with  charity  for  all,  with  firm 
ness  in  the  right  as  God  gives  us  to  see  the  right, 
let  us  strive  to  finish  the  work  we  are  in ;  to  bind 
up  the  nation's  wounds;  to  care  for  him  who  shall 
have  borne  the  battle,  and  for  his  widow  and  his 
orphan;  to  do  all  which  may  achieve  and  cherish 
a  just  and  lasting  peace  among  ourselves  and  with 
all  nations." 

This  was  like  a  sacred  poem.  No  American 
President  had  ever  spoken  words  like  these  to  the 
American  people.  America  never  had  a  President 
who  found  such  words  in  the  depth  of  his  heart. 

Now  followed  the  closing  scenes  of  the  war.  The 
Southern  armies  fought  bravely  to  the  last,  but  all 
in  vain.  Richmond  fell.  Lincoln  himself  entered 
the  city  on  foot,  accompanied  only  by  a  few  officers 
and  a  squad  of  sailors  who  had  rowed  him  ashore 
from  the  flotilla  in  the  James  River,  a  negro  picked 
up  on  the  way  serving  as  a  guide.  Never  had  the 
world  seen  a  more  modest  conqueror  and  a  more 
characteristic  triumphal  procession, — no  army  with 
banners  and  drums,  only  a  throng  of  those  who  had 
been  slaves,  hastily  run  together,  escorting  the  vic 
torious  chief  into  the  capital  of  the  vanquished  foe. 
We  are  told  that  they  pressed  around  him,  kissed 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  125 

his  hands  and  his  garments,and  shouted  and  danced 
for  joy,  while  tears  ran  down  the  President's  care- 
furrowed  cheeks. 

A  few  days  more  brought  the  surrender  of  Lee's 
army,  and  peace  was  assured.  The  people  of  the 
North  were  wild  with  joy.  Everywhere  festive  guns 
were  booming,  bells  pealing,  the  churches  ringing 
with  thanksgivings,and  jubilant  multitudes  throng 
ing  the  thoroughfares,  when  suddenly  the  news 
flashed  over  the  land  that  Abraham  Lincoln  had  been 
murdered.  The  people  were  stunned  by  the  blow. 
Then  a  wail  of  sorrow  went  up  such  as  America  had 
neverheard  before.  Thousands  of  Northern  house 
holds  grieved  as  if  they  had  lost  their  dearest  member. 
Many  a  Southern  man  cried  out  in  his  heart  that 
his  people  had  been  robbed  of  their  best  friend  in 
their  humiliation  and  distress,  when  Abraham  Lin 
coln  was  struck  down.  It  was  as  if  the  tender  affec 
tion  which  his  countrymen  bore  him  had  inspired  all 
nations  with  a  common  sentiment.  All  civilized 
mankind  stood  mourning  around  the  coffin  of  the 
dead  President.  Many  of  those,  here  and  abroad, 
who  not  long  before  had  ridiculed  and  reviled  him 
were  among  the  first  to  hasten  on  with  their  flowers 
of  eulogy,  and  in  that  universal  chorus  of  lamenta 
tion  and  praise  there  was  not  a  voice  that  did  not 


126  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

tremble  with  genuine  emotion.  Never  since  Wash 
ington's  death  had  there  been  such  unanimity  of 
judgment  as  to  a  man's  virtues  and  greatness;  and 
even  Washington's  death,  although  his  name  was 
held  in  greater  reverence,  did  not  touch  so  sympa 
thetic  a  chord  in  the  people's  hearts. 

Nor  can  it  be  said  that  this  was  owing  to  the  tragic 
character  of  Lincoln's  end.  It  is  true,  the  death  of 
this  gentlest  and  most  merciful  of  rulers  by  the  hand 
of  a  mad  fanatic  was  well  apt  to  exalt  him  beyond 
his  merits  in  the  estimation  of  those  who  loved  him, 
and  to  make  his  renown  the  object  of  peculiarly 
tender  solicitude.  But  it  is  also  true  that  the  ver 
dict  pronounced  upon  him  in  those  days  has  been 
affected  little  by  time,  and  that  historical  inquiry 
has  served  rather  to  increase  than  to  lessen  the  ap 
preciation  of  his  virtues,  his  abilities,  his  services. 
Giving  the  fullest  measure  of  credit  to  his  great 
ministers,  —  to  Seward  for  his  conduct  of  foreign 
affairs,  to  Chase  for  the  management  of  the  finances 
under  terrible  difficulties,  to  Stanton  for  the  per 
formance  of  his  tremendous  task  as  war  secretary, 
— and  readily  acknowledging  that  without  the  skill 
and  fortitude  of  the  great  commanders,  and  the 
heroism  of  the  soldiers  and  sailors  under  them,  suc 
cess  could  not  have  been  achieved,  the  historian 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  127 

still  finds  that  Lincoln's  judgment  and  will  were 
by  no  means  governed  by  those  around  him;  that 
the  most  important  steps  were  owing  to  his  initia 
tive;  that  his  was  the  deciding  and  directing  mind; 
and  that  it  was  preeminently  he  whose  sagacity  and 
whose  character  enlisted  for  the  administration  in 
its  struggles  the  countenance,  the  sympathy,  and 
the  support  of  the  people.  It  is  found,  even,  that 
his  judgment  on  military  matters  was  astonishingly 
acute,  and  that  the  advice  and  instructions  he  gave 
to  the  generals  commanding  in  the  field  would  not 
seldom  have  done  honor  to  the  ablest  of  them.  His 
tory,  therefore,  without  overlooking  or  palliating  or 
excusing  any  of  his  shortcomings  or  mistakes,  con 
tinues  to  place  him  foremost  among  the  saviours  of 
the  Union  and  the  liberators  of  the  slave.  More  than 
that,  it  awards  to  him  the  merit  of  having  accom 
plished  what  but  few  political  philosophers  would 
have  recognized  as  possible, — of  leading  the  re 
public  through  four  years  of  furious  civil  conflict 
without  any  serious  detriment  to  its  free  institu 
tions. 

He  was,  indeed,  while  President,  violently  de 
nounced  by  the  opposition  as  a  tyrant  and  a  usurper, 
for  having  gone  beyond  hisconstitutional  powers  in 
authorizing  or  permitting  the  temporary  suppres- 


128  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

sion  of  newspapers,  and  in  wantonly  suspending  the 
writ  of  habeas  corpus  and  resorting  to  arbitrary 
arrests.  Nobody  should  be  blamed  who,  when  such 
things  are  done,  in  good  faith  and  from  patriotic 
motives  protests  against  them.  In  a  republic,  arbi 
trary  stretches  of  power,  even  when  demanded  by 
necessity,  should  never  be  permitted  to  pass  without 
a  protest  on  the  one  hand,  and  without  an  apology 
on  the  other.  It  is  well  they  did  not  so  pass  dur 
ing  our  civil  war.  That  arbitrary  measures  were  re 
sorted  to,  is  true.  That  they  were  resorted  to  most 
sparingly,  and  only  when  the  government  thought 
them  absolutely  required  by  the  safety  of  the  repub 
lic,  will  now  hardly  be  denied.  But  certain  it  is 
that  the  history  of  the  world  does  not  furnish  a 
single  example  of  a  government  passing  through 
so  tremendous  a  crisis  as  our  civil  war  was  with  so 
small  a  record  of  arbitrary  acts,  and  so  little  inter 
ference  with  the  ordinary  course  of  law  outside 
the  field  of  military  operations.  No  American 
President  ever  wielded  such  power  as  that  which 
was  thrust  into  Lincoln's  hands.  It  is  to  be  hoped 
that  no  American  President  ever  will  have  to  be 
intrusted  with  such  power  again.  But  no  man  was 
ever  intrusted  with  it  to  whom  its  seductions  were 
less  dangerous  than  they  proved  to  be  to  Abraham 


._Ax/  /><//•/ 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  129 

Lincoln.  With  scrupulous  care  he  endeavored,  even 
under  the  most  trying  circumstances,  to  remain 
strictly  within  the  constitutional  limitations  of  his 
authority;  and  whenever  the  boundary  became  in 
distinct,  or  when  the  dangers  of  the  situation  forced 
him  to  cross  it,  he  was  equally  careful  to  mark  his 
acts  as  exceptional  measures,  justifiable  only  by  the 
imperative  necessities  of  the  civil  war,  so  that  they 
might  not  pass  into  history  as  precedents  for  simi 
lar  acts  in  time  of  peace.  It  is  an  unquestionable 
fact  that  during  the  reconstruction  period  which 
followed  the  war,  more  things  were  done  capable 
of  serving  as  dangerous  precedents  than  during  the 
war  itself.  Thus  it  may  truly  be  said  of  him  not 
only  that  under  his  guidance  the  republic  was  saved 
from  disruption  and  the  country  was  purified  of 
the  blot  of  slavery,  but  that,  during  the  stormiest 
and  most  perilous  crisis  in  our  history,  he  so  con 
ducted  the  government  and  so  wielded  his  almost 
dictatorial  power  as  to  leave  essentially  intact  our 
free  institutions  in  all  things  that  concern  the  rights 
and  liberties  of  the  citizen.  He  understood  well 
the  nature  of  the  problem.  In  his  first  message  to 
Congress  he  defined  it  in  admirably  pointed  lan 
guage:  "Must  a  government  be  of  necessity  too 
strong  for  the  liberties  of  its  own  people,  or  too 


1 3o  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

weak  to  maintain  its  own  existence  ?  Is  there  in 
all  republics  this  inherent  weakness  ? '  This  ques 
tion  he  answered  in  the  name  of  the  great  American 
republic,  as  no  man  could  have  answered  it  better, 
with  a  triumphant  "No." 

It  has  been  said  that  Abraham  Lincoln  died  at 
the  right  moment  for  his  fame.  However  that  may 
be,  he  had,  at  the  time  of  his  death,  certainly  not 
exhausted  his  usefulness  to  his  country.  He  was 
probably  the  only  man  who  could  have  guided  the 
nation  through  the  perplexities  of  the  reconstruc 
tion  period  in  such  a  manner  as  to  prevent  in  the 
work  of  peace  the  revival  of  the  passions  of  the  war. 
He  would  indeed  not  have  escaped  serious  contro 
versy  as  to  details  of  policy;  but  he  could  have 
weathered  it  far  better  than  any  other  statesman 
of  his  time,  for  his  prestige  with  the  active  politi 
cians  had  been  immensely  strengthened  by  his  tri 
umphant  reelection ;  and  what  is  more  important, 
he  would  have  been  supported  by  the  confidence 
of  the  victorious  Northern  people  that  he  would  do 
all  to  secure  the  safety  of  the  Union  and  the  rights 
of  the  emancipated  negro,  and  at  the  same  time 
by  the  confidence  of  the  defeated  Southern  people 
that  nothing  would  be  done  by  him  from  motives 
of  vindictiveness,  or  of  unreasonable  fanaticism,  or 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  131 

of  a  selfish  party  spirit.  "With  malice  toward  none, 
with  charity  for  all,"  the  foremost  of  the  victors 
would  have  personified  in  himself  the  genius  of 
reconciliation. 

He  might  have  rendered  the  country  a  great  ser 
vice  in  another  direction.  A  few  days  after  the  fall 
of  Richmond,  he  pointed  out  to  a  friend  the  crowd  of 
office-seekers  besieging  his  door.  "  Look  at  that," 
said  he.  "Now  we  have  conquered  the  rebellion, 
but  here  you  see  something  that  may  become  more 
dangerous  to  this  republic  than  the  rebellion  itself." 
It  is  true,  Lincoln  as  President  did  not  profess  what 
we  now  call  civil  service  reform  principles.  He  used 
the  patronage  of  the  government  in  many  cases 
avowedly  to  reward  party  work,  in  many  others  to 
form  combinations  and  to  produce  political  effects 
advantageous  to  theUnion  cause,  and  in  still  others 
simply  to  put  the  right  man  into  the  right  place. 
But  in  his  endeavors  to  strengthen  theUnion  cause, 
and  in  his  search  for  able  and  useful  men  for  pub 
lic  duties,  he  frequently  went  beyond  the  limits  of 
his  party,  and  gradually  accustomed  himself  to  the 
thought  that,  while  party  service  had  its  value,  con 
siderations  of  the  public  interest  were,  as  to  appoint 
ments  to  office,  of  far  greater  consequence.  More 
over,  there  had  been  such  a  mingling  of  different 


1 32  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

political  elements  in  support  of  the  Union  during 
the  civil  war  that  Lincoln,  standing  at  the  head 
of  that  temporarily  united  motley  mass,  hardly  felt 
himself,  in  the  narrow  sense  of  the  term,  a  party 
man.  And  as  he  became  strongly  impressed  with 
the  dangers  brought  upon  the  republic  by  the  use 
of  public  offices  as  party  spoils,  it  is  by  no  means 
improbable  that,  had  he  survived  the  all-absorbing 
crisis  and  found  time  to  turn  to  other  objects,  one  of 
the  most  important  reforms  of  later  days  would  have 
been  pioneered  by  his  powerful  authority.  This  was 
not  to  be.  But  the  measure  of  his  achievements  was 
full  enough  for  immortality. 

To  the  younger  generation  Abraham  Lincoln 
has  already  become  a  half-mythical  figure,  which, 
in  the  haze  of  historic  distance,  grows  to  more 
and  more  heroic  proportions,  but  also  loses  in  dis 
tinctness  of  outline  and  feature.  This  is  indeed  the 
common  lot  of  popular  heroes;  but  the  Lincoln 
legend  will  be  more  than  ordinarily  apt  to  become 
fanciful,  as  his  individuality,  assembling  seemingly 
incongruous  qualities  and  forces  in  a  character 
at  the  same  time  grand  and  most  lovable,  was  so 
unique,  and  his  career  so  abounding  in  startling 
contrasts.  As  the  state  of  society  in  which  Abraham 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN  133 

Lincoln  grew  up  passes  away,  the  world  will  read 
with  increasing  wonder  of  the  man  who,  not  only 
of  the  humblest  origin,  but  remaining  the  simplest 
and  most  unpretending  of  citizens,  was  raised  to  a 
position  of  power  unprecedented  in  our  history ; 
who  was  the  gentlest  and  most  peace-loving  of 
mortals,  unable  to  see  any  creature  suffer  without 
a  pang  in  his  own  breast,  and  suddenly  found  him 
self  called  to  conduct  the  greatest  and  bloodiest  of 
our  wars;  who  wielded  the  power  of  government 
when  stern  resolution  and  relentless  force  were  the 
order  of  the  day,  and  then  won  and  ruled  the 
popular  mind  and  heart  by  the  tender  sympathies 
of  his  nature;  who  was  a  cautious  conservative  by 
temperament  and  mental  habit,  and  led  the  most 
sudden  and  sweeping  social  revolution  of  our  time; 
who,  preserving  his  homely  speech  and  rustic  man 
ner  even  in  the  most  conspicuous  position  of  that 
period,  drew  upon  himself  the  scoffs  of  polite  so 
ciety,  and  then  thrilled  the  soul  of  mankind  with 
utterances  of  wonderful  beauty  and  grandeur; 
who,  in  his  heart  the  best  friend  of  the  defeated 
South,  was  murdered  because  a  crazy  fanatic  took 
him  for  its  most  cruel  enemy;  who,  while  in  power, 
was  beyond  measure  lampooned  and  maligned 


1 34  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN 

by  sectional  passion  and  an  excited  party  spirit, 
and  around  whose  bier  friend  and  foe  gathered  to 
praise  him  —  which  they  have  since  never  ceased 
to  do  —  as  one  of  the  greatest  of  Americans  and 
the  best  of  men. 

CARL  SCHURZ. 


LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


SMay'SOGIVI 

NOV15  1966  88 

JN  STACKS 

npn  \  Q  I960 

RECEIVED 

fAr  K  *  c 
RHC'D  LD 

NQV1    '66-9PW 

M/1Y  30  "^i 

LOAN  DEPT. 

I'lBRncr-u- 

FEB    9  1QM 

i|<ARr  u§ 

J/1A/      -i  - 

E7 

^/V    6  uoi- 

HB-CttOCr  5  33 

—  - 

JAWfi    1.Q62 

tt|«30\96S88 

•flfeTO?  3JR-C-D 

LD  21A-50m-4,'60 
(A9562slO)476B 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


